Cuendillar (Book and Q&A Spoilers)

[Luckers]

Brandon said...

 

8. Question: Was the Domination Band made of cuendillar?

 

8. Answer: The original one is made of cuendillar.  The one that was destroyed was a copy, but one would assume that the copies are made of cuendillar too.  The True Power works by destroying the Pattern.  Everything that is done with it involves damage to the Pattern.  For example, when we see Ishamael Travel, he does so by poking a hole in the Pattern.  Cuendillar can be destroyed using the True Power.  There is another way to destroy cuendillar, too.

 

... and I'm glad to hear it too. This makes something that has always bugged me make sense. That being, its said that using the One Power on cuendillar makes it stronger, but cuendillar was supposed to be unbreakable--how do you make something which is unbreakable any stronger.

 

The answer--using the One Power must make cuendillar more resistant to this other method of destroying it, and the Age of Legenders must have been aware of this.

 

So, any thoughts on what this other method is?

[Mr. Insane]

  Perhaps you can find it in T'A'H and change it to another substance there?

[ed2funy]

Could there be an un-weaving type weave that will destroy it indestructible aspect?

Like throw another weave opposite of the making weave that essentially dissolves the cuendillar weave before it is sucked up?

 

EDIT NEW: What is T'A'H? You mean TAR?

[Mr. Insane]

yeah, my bad.  T'A'R

[Luckers]

Tel'aran'harriet?

 

 

[ed2funy]

lmao...

 

It could be an idea...

but when you take it out it would go back to Cuendillar...

 

When Moggy threatens to make Nyn into the Holy Form every time she enters TAR, she will not be in the Holy Form outside of the Dream.

[Luckers]

Sometimes I get the urge to kill people. It's times like these that I wonder why I restrain myself.

 

I imagine the trick has something to do with the nature of a cuendillar thread in the pattern. It resists metaphysical balefire burning, so clearly the process of changing iron to cuendillar in some way changes the nature of the thread itself, and that change goes back in time.

 

Perhaps you're right, and its not destroying it straight out that is important, but rather changing it back to iron, or changing it again into something else.

[ed2funy]

That is the only thing I can think of right now...

 

 

[Luckers]

And if that were the case, maybe using the One Power on it makes it more stable. As in makes it more resistant to changing back (or into something else).

[lordofsoup]

well the Aes Sedai have just become peddlers, it should lower their oppinions of themselves a bit.  Correct me if i am wrong, the TP can destroy cuendillar, because it works in opposition to the Wheel of Time and eats away at Saidin and Saidar.  So we need something that can destroy the One Power, Im thinking Fain possibly has the ability, as he is like an anti-DO. 

[ed2funy]

If it were a weave that could change it back, I don't think it would be useless after so much time the Cuendillar had sucked up other weaves.

 

If using the One Power made it more stable against being turned back, then the weave wouldn't always work.

Once a weave works, it always does. ;)

 

Also, maybe Cuendillar doesn't get stronger when the OP is used on it...AS have claimed many thing they thought were true.

 

EDIT NEW: lol....Selling Cuendillar like common peddlers (though even Kings and Queens don't own a lot).

 

Fain could be another idea.

Maybe a scratch from the SL knife makes it just disintegrate.

[Teslan]

We've already encountered something else that can destroy cuendillar.

 

 

See seals.

[ed2funy]

???

[Luckers]

If using the One Power made it more stable against being turned back, then the weave wouldn't always work.

Once a weave works, it always does.

 

Thats not true if there are opposing forces involved. For instance we've seen shields work, but then against Nynaeve Moghedian's didn't. Coz she had a giant wedge of spirit holding it back.

 

So we need something that can destroy the One Power, Im thinking Fain possibly has the ability, as he is like an anti-DO.  

 

That's an interesting thought, especially with what Brandon said about other sources of power and evil that Mordeth hunted in his search for a way to destroy the Dark One--the things that changed him into what he is.

 

We've already encountered something else that can destroy cuendillar.

 

 

See seals.

 

The seals were destroyed by the Dark One under the same premise as how the True Power destroyed cuendillar--it may even be that the Dark One used True Power to do it (though that is not certain based on Brandon's RAFO's on the question of the Dark One and True Power).

 

Brandon said there was another way to destroy cuendillar in addition to that method.

[ed2funy]

If using the One Power made it more stable against being turned back, then the weave wouldn't always work.

Once a weave works, it always does.

 

Thats not true if there are opposing forces involved. For instance we've seen shields work, but then against Nynaeve Moghedian's didn't. Coz she had a giant wedge of spirit holding it back.

 

But the weave hadn't actually been set yet, therefore it didn't have a chance to complete.

 

[Luckers]

Ok I'll go at it a different way. Compulsion can be undone by reversing what was done to it. It is set, but then they unset it. I suggest the same here with cuendillar.

[ed2funy]

That is what I said.

It seems like you were saying (I will use Compulsion as the example) that if more and more Compulsion weaves are layered on, that another person could not remove it.

Do you understand me?

 

Even if Cuendillar gets 'stronger' with other weaves of the OP, then if the hypothetical unweaving weave can always unweave it.

[Mr. Insane]

Ok I'll go at it a different way. Compulsion can be undone by reversing what was done to it. It is set, but then they unset it. I suggest the same here with cuendillar.

 

 

  but undoing compulsion in this manner does not undo the damage to the brain.  would it make sense for undoing the cuendillar weave to undo the change in consistency of the metal in question? I think it could still be cuendillar.

[ed2funy]

Using the Compulsion weaves parallel still:

 

The base metal (usually iron) may be stronger, but it would not be cuendillar anymore.

The iron would not be indestructible to the OP, it would only be stronger than steel.

Normal human tools would be unable to destroy it (depending of course how much of the OP was used on it in its time as Cuendillar).

[Luckers]

That is what I said.

It seems like you were saying (I will use Compulsion as the example) that if more and more Compulsion weaves are layered on, that another person could not remove it.

Do you understand me?

 

Even if Cuendillar gets 'stronger' with other weaves of the OP, then if the hypothetical unweaving weave can always unweave it.

 

Got you now. And no I'm not saying that if more compulsion weaves were layered on it would make it impossible to reverse, just that it would make it more difficult (note: the word used there is 'stronger'. Using the power against cuendillar makes it 'stronger'). As in to undo it you'd have to try harder, use more raw strength, work for longer, or have a greater innate talent for doing it.

 

But I should also pull away from the parallel. This 'strengthening' aspect is something unique to cuendillar--and its not just layering more 'cuendillarizing' on it, its saturating the heart stone with the power, and thus in someway locking it in that form, or making it more stable.

 

This is not a weave 'failing', it is a weave working against an opposing force. Akin to the way Mat's SL 'sickness' resisted healing more than normal sicknesses, because the was a power within that illness sustainting it. Thus it took more strength and care to undo.

 

  but undoing compulsion in this manner does not undo the damage to the brain.  would it make sense for undoing the cuendillar weave to undo the change in consistency of the metal in question? I think it could still be cuendillar.

 

My guess is yes. Though metal is more resistant and less delicate than the human brain, so who knows.

[Bobbun]

All cuendillar must eventually be destroyed, otherwise each turning of the wheel would leave more and more of it lying about until all the world was filled with heartstone, and there was no iron left.

[Luckers]

The wheel might do full physical resets at the end of each turning. It would explain some things.

[lordofsoup]

if the TP can destroy heartstone, could Saidin and Saidar working in unison do it as well?  I find it hard to beleive that it can't.  I assume that the taint on Saidin was a small layering of the TP put on it.  If Saidin and Saidar working together could defeat the taint put on Saidin by the DO/TP.  then i assume using the tow of them together could break cuedillar.  

[ed2funy]

Got you now. And no I'm not saying that if more compulsion weaves were layered on it would make it impossible to reverse, just that it would make it more difficult (note: the word used there is 'stronger'. Using the power against cuendillar makes it 'stronger'). As in to undo it you'd have to try harder, use more raw strength, work for longer, or have a greater innate talent for doing it.

 

But I should also pull away from the parallel. This 'strengthening' aspect is something unique to cuendillar--and its not just layering more 'cuendillarizing' on it, its saturating the heart stone with the power, and thus in someway locking it in that form, or making it more stable.

 

Ok...I get you now...

though, I didn't exactly mean just more 'layering', I was trying to compare adding more Compulsion to Heartstone sucking up the OP to make it stronger.

 

Ok, I agree that it would just take more strength or power or time to unweave it.

 

EDIT NEWS: I don't think they are going to make all the iron into Cuendillar.

Also, iron would not disappear...

Just because iron is used does not mean there is less to produce in later turnings.

 

EDIT NEW: It could be, but in the AoL they didn't know how. And they regualrly worked together.

Though, we have seen the Forsaken say how the 'primitives' have come up with new things...so meh..who knows.

[lordofsoup]

The TP works to destroy the Pattern.  If it can destroy heartstone, then we need something else that can destroy the pattern to do it as well.  anyway, does balefire pass through heartstone, or does it block it