Companion- Question answered and left unanswered

[Ryrin]

Just got mine!  *excited*

[MauricXe]

The entry on Nakomi is lacking...

That was one of the few reasons I purchased the companion.

 

-Nakomi's identity/role

-Tuon and Artur's meeting

-Some of the power level rankings. Although not major but I wanted a few confirmations

-Rand's exact third question

 

Three of those weren't even close to being answered. I'm a bit bummed

[Terez]

Reading about power rankings really made my head hurt.

 

You sure ain't kidding. My ADD kicked in immediately and I just gave up.

 

I am hoping that someone will just make a nice graph or spreadsheet that will list all the channelers in order.

 

Someone already did, before the Encyclopedia was released, based on the few entries they released in advance along with a few things I shared from the notes in order to clarify how the rankings work.

 

The two numbers in blue are how the Aes Sedai power rankings appeared in RJ's notes. He apparently started out with a scale from 1-33, with Elaida etc. at the top and Daigian at the bottom. He then expanded the scale to include the Forsaken, which put Lanfear at the top. Thereafter he included both numbers in his notes on female channelers, with the second number in parentheses, to make sure he didn't confuse the two scales. Later he added the strengths of the male Forsaken and he apparently decided there would be 6 male levels on top of the 66 female levels for a total of 72 levels. That's the numbers all the way to the left in the green column.

 

I did my own spreadsheet for the numbers we found in the notes, but I haven't yet checked it against the Companion or added any new ones. I'd share that one but I don't want to confuse anyone; I know of a few differences already, mostly but not always related to conflicting numbers in the notes.

[dexterryu]

I'd have really liked some explanation on the wheel and what each of the seven ages were like. It's hinted that our time was the age that preceded the age of legends, and we get some glimpses at the possible 4th age through the Rhudian rings, but I really want to know what happens during the others.

 

I did find the Land of the Madmen entry to be interesting and sufficient. It wasn't long but it explained a good bit as to why it wasn't really in the story.

[Jagen Sedai]

 

Terez, thank you for sharing that! It makes it much easier to understand.

 

[Entreri]

One thing that was surprising about the top tier was that Rahvin was as strong as LTT and Ishamael. I don't think anybody saw that coming. Same goes for Semirhage being as strong as Lanfear.

 

Rahvin was a beast, no wonder he felt certain he could beat Lanfear and decided to confront Ishamael in book 3.

[Sabio]

After reading what Casudane's jewlery were, you realize what a bad ass she really was.

[Entreri]

Cadsuane is definitely a Juggernaut. She had an angreal=top level of the men strength, ter'angreal like Mat's and with some extra features, Well ter'angreal, one detects a man's ability to channel, one that detects saidin/saidar in tiny amounts, armor ter'angreal etc and etc. 

 

The Power rankings in the Companion are a bit strange. Her being stronger than Elayne, Egwene and Aviendha makes no sense and contradicts the books, unless we are talking about the 3 girl's current levels. So I wonder how much of this is Jordan's original vs. Team Jordan's conjectures. 

[Cosmic Champion]

 

Reading about power rankings really made my head hurt.

 

You sure ain't kidding. My ADD kicked in immediately and I just gave up.

 

I am hoping that someone will just make a nice graph or spreadsheet that will list all the channelers in order.

 

Someone already did, before the Encyclopedia was released, based on the few entries they released in advance along with a few things I shared from the notes in order to clarify how the rankings work.

 

 

Thanks for posting that.  

 

 

...... makes no sense and contradicts the books, unless we are talking about the 3 girl's current levels. So I wonder how much of this is Jordan's original vs. Team Jordan's conjectures. 

 

This is a very, very good point here. I have been finding assorted bits and pieces of contradictions to the books.  How Healing works is just one such example.

 

Plus, if you take a gander at the book's 'Introduction', it states that we will find that this is the case in some of the entries. Here is part of it below:

 

...we make certain disclaimers about the material. In some instances, the descriptions may vary from what is in the books. Writers constantly change their minds about characters, events and places in their creations, and adjustments often fail to be made in the background notes. We have tried to correct all discrepancies of this sort, but sometimes let the more interesting ones stand, to show a change from the writer's original intention compared with what finally arrived on the printed page. Or, the error remained because of our oversight.

 

 

This will certainly make it difficult determining if some certain entries are canon, or are not.  LMAO

 

 

Questions left unanswered:

• Jaim Aybarra - Is still 'sort of' Perrin's cousin.   LOL
• Perrin's bonding to Hopper's soul, mirroring Isam/Luc's dual sole version - From the Brandon interviews published over on theoryland, Brandon pretty much confirms(through some cute fan Q&A) that this happened between Perrin and Hopper in ToM, thus saving Hopper's soul from eternal oblivion. So far I have found nothing that addresses this.

[mbuehner]

So I bit the bullet and picked up the Companion. I guess I cant say im disappointed, mainly because I pretty much knew what I was getting into. No offense to Harriet, but you can tell this it the work of an editor and some fact checkers. We all pretty much knew that this was going to be a 'authors reference' compilation, but for the average fan that saw this and picked it up, they have a legitimate gripe. There's no question this the companion is really just a giant glossary to make it easy for Jordan to remember various trivia, especially for the lesser characters.

 

The thing with the power levels is the best example- does a reader really care how RJ kept track of things in his mind, versus how things worked in the story? The paranthesis thing is annoying and pointless, you just subtract 12 from the 'main' number. Every time (except when its wrong, which on several occasions the math is done wrong). Its pointless. Worse- all that number tells you is the AS power level BEFORE the story started. Oh, and AFTER the Aiel war, because Cadsuane, Karene and others were off that chart, so it made no sense to retcon the Aes Sedai to use the 'old chart', when women within living memory (in fact alive) were off the chart. The obvious answer was to ignore the way Jordan kept his notes, and just assign a single power ranking. Lanfear at the top, etc.

 

But anyway- point being the book is very much a hodgepodge of Jordans notes (which granted, we knew going in) and a very small amount of new material, little of which answers the questions most of us had. Contrast that to how Christoper Tolkien approached the Silmilarian and you'll see the difference. Not that the gang should have tried to write a book, but that instead of running down every tiny detail on the fishing practices in Saldea, they might have been better served carving those notes into a more cohesive service to the story, and maybe making some logical inferences on the big mysteries left hanging.

[Occams whiskey bottle]

I'm going to wait and purchase a used copy at a better price. Definitely want this book to round out my collection, but don't want to pay the bloated price. What I find really surprising is how many people are surprised by what they bought. No surprise in my world that it's just an encyclopedia. As far as Nokoma it's been well documented that BS created Nokoma in earlier books to give a little added meaning to the epilogue. No one really knows who the person in the epilogue really is with the exception of RJ, though I highly doubt that Harriet doesn't know. Perhaps years down the road she will give added context.

[Owena]

I never post, but I just had to log in to say "look at Bela's entry!" Lol, she lives! Haha

 

Harriet read that entry at the book signing I went to, and I had to fight tooth and nail not to start crying. 

[mbuehner]

 

I never post, but I just had to log in to say "look at Bela's entry!" Lol, she lives! Haha

 

Harriet read that entry at the book signing I went to, and I had to fight tooth and nail not to start crying. 

 

 

Its clear Bela was called back as a Hero of the Horn ;)

[szilard]

No offense to Harriet, but you can tell this it the work of an editor and some fact checkers.

 

I'm so angry. We have these fantastic fans - I talk about 10-15 really dedicated people -, just GIVE THEM all the stuff, and they will produce a mindbending book or books. Is it really that hard?

 

250-400 pages: the most important interviews with footnotes

100-150 pages: t m i theories with commentaries

300-500 pages: t m i stuff from his notes (of course, I would like to buy in print all of his notes)