Super Moiraine

[vanceme]

Does anyone else feel moiraine has super powers? I just started a full reread and she does some mighty amazing things with her staff as a focal point in the first book (angreal aside). I don't know whether to think she's just really badass or jobert Jordan hadn't entirely thought out the one power before he started writing

[Cyrus_OLeary]

My personal view is that Moraine is just a mega-badass, kinda like Lan.

[dscott8]

Blue Ajah or not, Moiraine has dedicated her life to getting the Dragon Reborn to the Last Battle. She is in fact more Green than Blue. She knew the Dragon would be a target and developed the skills to defend him. She's also one of the more impressively powerful Aes Sedai in recent memory (until Nynaeve came along, anyway).

[Phelix]

Moiraine is most definitely not more Green than Blue.

 

Blues seek after purposes, causes... Moiraine and Siuan both took the cause of finding, protecting and guiding the Dragon Reborn. They didn't stand ready for the Last Battle, they didn't prepare to counter Dreadlords, and they certainly didn't wander the world promoting Justice with the strength of their Warders' arms.

 

They were very good Blues.

 

Now, as for the original question.....

 

It's a bit of both. Moiraine is incredibly badass... she does what's necessary, when it's necessary and damn the consequences or rules that try to stand in her way. Remember her phrase "Take what you want, and pay for it later." That said, in the first books, RJ still hadn't nailed down the specifics of the One Power system. The things he had Moiraine do, that he had Rand do, or Ishy for that matter, just don't fit with the rules he shared later.

[Lacanos]

She's also a pretty amazing healer

[vanceme]

I think its mentioned later in the series that healing is almost a Talent with her. One of the things that interests me most is how often she uses "concentration aids". More so than other aes sedai it seems. Especially since some of her badassness occurs with an angreal. I picture her as developing weaves that are capable of much more than a more boring aes sedai would be able to accomplish with their time tested weaves (of the same power level)

[nolirion]

Before Egwene and Nynaeve showed up Moraine was considered one of the most powerful Aes'Sedai of her time .

At the beginning of the book we have only PoV of Non channeler or Willbe Channeler , that saying many of the PoV we see at that time are exaggerating many thing (from the One-power to the strength of the shadowspawn ) .

To me it is more a sign of how the perception of the world have changed for our TR fellow .

[Phelix]

Before Egwene and Nynaeve showed up Moraine was considered one of the most powerful Aes'Sedai of her time .

At the beginning of the book we have only PoV of Non channeler or Willbe Channeler , that saying many of the PoV we see at that time are exaggerating many thing (from the One-power to the strength of the shadowspawn ) .

To me it is more a sign of how the perception of the world have changed for our TR fellow .

 

 

I disagree... sort of.

 

In the first books, Moiraine uses "focus items," she unweaves wards, and she does a bunch of other little things that just don't fit with the rest of the books. She's not the only one. Thom survives a Myrddraal with only a limp. Rand channels the Eye with a giant, glowing cord connecting him to it. Traveling in the prologue.... the list goes on. There are many things that RJ tightened down as he progressed with the series.

[Morsker]

I disagree... sort of.

 

In the first books, Moiraine uses "focus items," she unweaves wards, and she does a bunch of other little things that just don't fit with the rest of the books. She's not the only one. Thom survives a Myrddraal with only a limp. Rand channels the Eye with a giant, glowing cord connecting him to it. Traveling in the prologue.... the list goes on. There are many things that RJ tightened down as he progressed with the series.

The cord connecting Rand to the Eye makes sense to me. The True Source isn't in normal three-dimensional space, and when channelers "reach" towards it they aren't reaching in any normal dimension, so there's no cord to see. But the Eye is in normal space, so we see the cord.

 

The "focus items" I agree don't fit with the setting, but to me they feel like RJ deliberately fudging and catering to new readers by giving Moraine familiar "wizard" stuff, a staff and glowing jewelry, with full intent to phase it out later. I feel giving Moiraine the angreal is part of the same thing; it lets him make her more powerful for the story, without having to worry so much about implications later.

[Phelix]

I disagree... sort of.

 

In the first books, Moiraine uses "focus items," she unweaves wards, and she does a bunch of other little things that just don't fit with the rest of the books. She's not the only one. Thom survives a Myrddraal with only a limp. Rand channels the Eye with a giant, glowing cord connecting him to it. Traveling in the prologue.... the list goes on. There are many things that RJ tightened down as he progressed with the series.

The cord connecting Rand to the Eye makes sense to me. The True Source isn't in normal three-dimensional space, and when channelers "reach" towards it they aren't reaching in any normal dimension, so there's no cord to see. But the Eye is in normal space, so we see the cord.

 

The "focus items" I agree don't fit with the setting, but to me they feel like RJ deliberately fudging and catering to new readers by giving Moraine familiar "wizard" stuff, a staff and glowing jewelry, with full intent to phase it out later. I feel giving Moiraine the angreal is part of the same thing; it lets him make her more powerful for the story, without having to worry so much about implications later.

 

I could buy that, except we've seen wells later in the series, and no one connected to them had a glowing cord. The Eye is a giant, super special well that holds saidin made physical... but it's still a well, so the others should behave similarly to it. No?

 

I can also see how you'd be right about RJ planning to phase those things out... and unless he answered a question on that, we'll never know.

[Soraz]

I think the narrative style matches the experience of the main protagonists.

 

Since neither of them EVER saw an Aei Sedai before, much less anyone else channeling, every "spell" cast,

was wonderous and mighty.

 

Same with Myhrdrall. In the first few books, NOONE could stand against a myhrdral without insane luck.

 

 

As the boys gains XP, every other person around them channel like crazy, making it less wonderous and mighty.

[Ananta]

Lan had hard time fighting a Myrdraal in tEotW. I was saddened.

 

And yeah, Moiraine was pretty God-like, at least in tEotW. (Finished a re-read of the book today xD)

[Mandro]

I mentioned about how the white tower hierarchy made randworld retarded (the actual meaning, not the perjorative.) because they closed in on themselves forgetting the world and treating those who lived in the world as tools and not as people. Moiraine might be a mega-ninja-AS not cuz she has special knowledge, or at least not in terms of some gnostic faith, but rather because she spent her time out in the world having to deal with all that the world could throw at her.

 

And it was mentioned that she was one of the most powerful AS "in" the tower. It's mentioned in New Spring, it's mentioned by Siuan about how it could have been moiraine on the amyrlin seat, it's mentioend by elaida in her pride of "finding" elayne, increasing her and the red ajah's prestige.

 

I think that the big difference, isn't that Moiraine found the right book to give her the right info to be the ninja channeler that she is (she seems to be he only non specialized AS in the entire series) but that she, unlike the rest of the AS she spent "almost 20 years" out in the world seeking out the dragon reborn.