I don't get how so many people are confused about the all caps voice. It's only seen a few times in the series. 

It's the dark one.

It gets confusing - because rand also 'talks' like that while outside the pattern, but - it's just the dark one.

RJ's quotes collaborate and reinforce that. 

 

 The Gathering Storm; The Last that Could be Done

"Elza ran toward the door. She vanished before another bar of light, her entire figure becoming light for a moment" 

Done, lol. 

Not entirely true friend. Rand in fact attempted to blow up a battlefront, and help out Rand, but they had channelers going straight for him whenever they saw him. Also, with demandred in a full circle, it's doubtful Rand would attack - thats why only the non-channelers had any luck with kicking his butt. Logain had a serious issue. 

meh, i'll accept it then. as i said. 

Yeah, post-end-game speculation and theorizing is a depressing major. Much like liberal arts. 

this whole thing needs to be moved the the cyclical nature thread lulz. But here's what I'm getting at. To what extent did Rand lock the dark one up. He's not popping bubbles, or touching the world, but he was kept alive so that people could go their own ways and not go psycho. The cycle has been broken, or changed. There will not be any 'going over' in the future, unless someone comes along to drill the bore, which i doubt will happen also, because we've broken the traditional age transition barrier. The age transition is a cataclysmic event that happens, and prevents the continuation and proliferation of knowledge. IE the breaking of the world, we lost a lot of information - a lot of how's and why's, and had to restart, while dealing with the growing threat of a dark one problem. 

Here we find ourselves in a situation where the white tower is whole, the asha'man are trusted friends rescuing kitteh's from trees, and while a lot of people died - we still have our sanity. Nothing horrifying happened on a level where we lost something. We now know not to go looking for the true power, so unless something man-made happens that disrupts the continuance of knowledge, the prison is staying sealed. Therefor, the dark one is no more, the forsaken are all 'taken care of' and the dreadlords are all dead, or hiding like crazy - and to what end? a bunch of mid-level channelers, they're not the forsaken by any bit. Within a few generations, the knowledge of creating shadowspawn will be gone, if it's not already. The idea of the dark one being a legion of doom entity is done for. 

People may rise to fill the void of evil-doers but the dark one was an established pair to the creator and a pivotal device in the wheel of time. It's not anymore. the pattern will adapt to a new pivot point. 

Also, i feel like when the dust settles, the sharan's in their homeland are in for a fairly academic responses. 

that makes more sense in the long run. 

I respect that, and don't mean to offend. I simply see a certain type of finality in all cyclical systems. It always goes around and around until it doesn't. That doesn't mean that the pattern is destroyed, rather a new cycle is born, out of necessity. Rand could have completely destroyed the dark one, his PoV showed us that, what would have happened then? His creations probably would have come to pass, as he imagined. Then we'd have a new cycle. The champion of the light would possibly be spun out- but only if he had a need to. LTT and Moridin aren't as linked as you'd believe, otherwise we'd have massive conflicts with the two of them sporadically over the course of 2 ages, with Ishy/Moridin only partially sealed. 

Of course, you can say that 'maybe the dragon was spun out and didn't do anything, just laid low' 

but.

Rand had no clue what/who he was, he didn't get a choice, I assume the shadow would want very much to kill the Champion of the light - and they're kind of rambunctious when they get momentum. We'd have noticed it. 

You have to remember, we have Moridin saying the two are linked. He's bonkers, if not well collected and sane LOOKING, he's nuts and wants to be a popular kid. 

And we have Rand in his dreamshard saying 'screw off, I'mma show you how i roll, without you.' 

As for the who eternally spun out thing, I haven't seen that quote. I'm sure it's possible - and I'll resend my theory if it came from RJ, but I'd think that would be eternally exhausting to be constantly fighting some guy, over and over again. G/B sometimes get spun out to have a family and rest, and be at peace. Rand and moridin aren't having a family. I hope. 

The first big long post on the cyclical nature thread nailed an interesting point, I can't redo his post, but essentially, the DO exists outside of time, and whenever there is a confrontation at the bore, him - versus the champion, we see the events lead towards another age. Either by a patch, or him touching the world, but Rand's solution wasn't defeating him - however, it is safe to say that what happened in the end of the book has NEVER happened before. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the 'how' there - as it was basically callandor that saved the world, and it's construction is surrounded in bads. You can only make a sa'angreal if you have the means to use the powers it uses. IE a circle of men/lades blah blah, but this one - the creators had intimate knowledge of the True Power. I can only claim that as authorial oversight, otherwise a badguy who had TP access broke their oaths, which we know as impossible for channelers. (The only other option i have is that Lanfear created the sword. She was the one who drilled the bore, and one might assume, was one of the first to have access to the TP, maybe before she realized the evil nature of the DO, and before she turned. Meh, dunno. 

What i'm getting at, up until this point, the wheel may have been on a specific cycle. It's changed now.

Golly this got off track. damn you nakomi. . 

Skyfoo has it i think. Maybe. It's one of those things.

I do believe Nakomi may be in some way - Illyena. It has a proper fit to it - but at the same time doesn't. Rand's epiphatree moment was unique to the series and it's practically ridiculous to assume others' were given such insight into past lives. Furthermore - this creator-avatar thing is dribble. The creator hasn't been involved at all through the books, why start now? Just squelch it. I know ya'll want God to be there, but he's pretty much outta the loop. THE CAPS weren't him either. It's the dark one or LTT/Rand yelling, thats all it is. (We absolutely know this too, so plox don't argue. The Rand vs. Dark one fight was hard as crap to track the first time through because they both got to yell. Rand should have gotten italics.) 

Verin died, also. Doubtful that she'd be transmigrated for the benefit of the greater good. 

Not ruling out her being one of the founding Jenn's - but it's a hard one to prove. I like that idea though, the whole 'end of the AoL' thing is fascinating to me. Like how callandor was made, the eye, rhuidean, etc etc. 

I'm also confident that the body swap was due to the balefire snaffoo. Rand had old like memories, I figure he'd have thought to try it to save his own life if it was a weave thing. 

Also, as for the 'other dragons' thing. We have only documented proof of Rand Al'Thor and Lews Therin as being spun out incarnations of the Dragon's soul. I like to look at it way deeper and say they're the ONLY two who have been the dragon. The whole, we've been fighting forever and will be forever thing seems like the forsaken trying to throw religion on it, they have no clue about pre AoL dragons, and Rand pretty well likely halted the need for the Dragon to be spun again to face the shadow. 

Thus, the dragon is simply a hero of the horn. Spun out extremely selectively for the greatest purpose. (I do believe this was confirmed too, by RJ or BS) so I doubt that the second age had a dragon, and I honestly really doubt that Nakomi is a lady dragon. Sorry 

So ok. I can't not do this. The Flame of Tar Valon is supposedly the counter of balefire, thus explaining why it neutralized M'hael's beam. I get that, accept it, and am happy. It also counters the damage that balefire does to the pattern, IE the fixing the cracks with rock like bandaids. I get it, accept it, it works. 

but does it also counter balefire's other effect - of burning a thread from the pattern? If it did - it would add a thread to the pattern? I don't know - i'm just reaching for a theory here. Maybe balefire's apparent burning a thread from the pattern isn't right. Maybe balefire as a killing machine isn't it's legit purpose, and balefire just destroys the pattern. That would make her weave more logical as a counter.

Plus the mystery scepter probably had a buffer, which Vora's wand didn't, so you have Egwene's already massive capacity + an unlimited draw. 

Dem was also in a circle of 72. Taim wasn't. 

(: I absolutely loved the idea of the Eldrene thing, loved the nod to it, and I really enjoyed how she turned it selfless. 

 

Egwenes death was like Lews Therin's death in a much smaller scale actually..

Adctually it mirrored Eldrene's death much more closely.

I myself thought and worded that - the defending the honor of a love now lost, blind rage killing the crap outta things that Eldrene did - but that is absolutely not the case with Eggy. She didn't create this new weave and use herself up in vengeance, rather to restore, repair, and ultimately save the world enough that Rand could finish the job. The pillar of light reference in my opinion could have been seen as a reference to LTT's creating dragonmount, and committing oneself to the pattern

there wasn't much family development with her parents. I'd have liked to see their reaction to things in her life more that I was given. 

First of all, her death was completely foreshadowed  She was one person i was POSITIVE would die (Even though I didn't want that, she's my favorite character) It was subtle. All that work up, all the amazing things she did, all the toes she stepped on, her super fast rise to power. It's as the GB/Siuane conversation went in the tower when rand showed up: She's the one they need now. now. as in, she's got about one serious use in her, and that is owning ass. Maybe it was a feeling more than foreshadow. But i knew when Gawyn had the rings, he was dead. I knew he'd drive her insane. (Which didn't happen to my liking) But safe to say, I just knew she was toast. 

As for the whole 'over drawing power' through Vora's wand, I'd say need found it's way into the real world. She needed to kill him. She needed to make Eldrene proud. and she did. 

I thought I had remembered a scene where perrin gets a sideways glance from an Aes Sedai concerning his eyes, but I can't find proof of it anywhere. :(

Simple question? maybe not

LTT, in the EoTW prologue killed himself. Did he in fact use balefire to do so? If so, we have never before seen anything react to balefire such as the earth did in that moment. We witnessed Rand blowing a fortress away with CK fueled bf, and it disappeared, no ground upheaval of any kind. Also, given the nature of balefire, this brings up the 'you shoot yourself in the foot with it, what happens?' question, obviously this is the prime example. He obviously died, but wouldn't it negate a few of his actions? IE creating dragonmount, maybe even killing his wifey. (depending on how far in the past that was)

I don't know but it's been bugging me.

Simple answer: The gholam is actually spock, transporter on the enterprise in space, wham, bam, thank you Tam.

Variation on the gateway idea. Tear a hole into T'A'R and let it be their problem if it survived the gateway.

Did Rand ever tell anyone specifically that he used the True Power, or just 'i killed them' and then go about banishing caddy to the far reaches of his peripheral?