A great end to the story.  You can choose to focus on the writing - less polish/poise, less descriptive, more action-oriented.  I knew it would that way - Sanderson overall did a great job, and I choose to focus on the big picture.

The three main things that bothered me were the ability to tie off gateways (I thought this couldn't be done?  If it can there are serious and illogical missed opportunities to do so).  Also, having the Choedan Kal would have saved tens of thousands of lives - I will never agree with Rand's decision on that one (or anyone that backs that decision).  Finally, the off-screen deaths.  At least let me see Bashere go down, he was one of my favorites.  I don't think Sanderson can write his dialog properly but he definitely could have done a quick death scene.

The moments of awesome far outweigh my largest complaints.  Too many amazing moments to mention...Lan/Demandred, Perrin/Slayer, Mat/Demandred (the general's duel), Rand/DO....  I was satisfied with the confrontation with the Dark One; I had no idea how that was going to play out, and I enjoyed it greatly.  Those of us who predicted the use of the True Power as a buffer were correct - I remember a lot of people calling that theory out as ridiculous.  Props to the originator of the body-swap theory - I was never sure whether or not I thought that would happen.

Also I would have traded Elayne for Egwene.  Alas, an idiot still sits the Lion Throne.

Al dival, al kiserai, al mashi!

"I don't know what that is," Bashere said quietly, "but I think maybe you should wait before deciding to break it. Eh?"

If questions to the Aelfinn that touch on the Shadow are dangerous, I think it's safe to assume that requests to the Eelfinn that directly affect the Shadow are even moreso. Also I imagine the treaties prevent requests to kill people outright.

Does it bother anyone else that Snakes and Foxes is a game that "can't be won," but based on the descriptions (mostly at the end of ToM), you can make a toss of the dice where the Snakes and Foxes don't move at all? Doesn't it follow that if you have a hot hand with the dice, the game is in fact winnable?

Exactly Suttree, awesome scene and great overall sequence.

And I felt the same way about Demandred, Sid. I cling to my being correct about Dashiva because it's one of the few spot-on guesses I made amidst a far larger amount of incorrect ones...

For what it's worth, here's what I think a shield held by six channelers looks like:

http://www.freeimagehosting.net/zly7o

You can see the six points as described prior to Dumai's Wells. The source lies directly behind where the six points intersect on the concave side of the lens. Shields are described as being elastic (notably after Nynaeve heals Logain). A shield held by a single channeler is more elastic - if the shielded person reaches towards the Source with enough strength, forcing the lens to become less convex to the point that the Source breaks the plane of the shield, it shatters. A shield held by six is far less elastic, but not brittle. Once any section of the shield is tied off, it becomes brittle, and breakable via the trick Lews Therin showed Rand. Once a section is broken, the remaining sections each need to pick up the slack, so to speak, making the overall structure more elastic, and therefore more prone to catastrophic failure.

That's always been my perception, anyway.

What gave it away for me was the scene in Path of Daggers where he undergoes a complete personality change and starts to lecture Rand on the "strangeness" of Saidin (during Rand's campaign against the Seanchan in Altara). He's suddenly a different person altogether, angry and pedantic instead of his typical aloof and apathetic self, which made me think the whole "guy with his head in the clouds" thing was a front. The fact that we knew Aginor was in his new body trying to position himself made him the prime suspect.

In TFoh, "To Caemlyn" it's stated that "Faolain had been tested and raised" without the Oath Rod making her "not quite" Aes Sedai. But there's no mention of the ter'angreal that Aes Sedai enter that places them in situations of stress. How could she have been properly tested without that ter'angreal? I get the funny image of a bunch of Aes Sedai standing around flicking her and making exploding noises while she performs the weaves...

....To me this is the key. I have not seen one person be able to say how the deal gives AS a leg up or some competitive advantage....

One advantage arises due to the fact that the WT Aes Sedai believe that through some divine right all *angreal are rightfully their property. So unless something changes, it certainly allows them access to more objects of the power (via taking them away from other channelers within the constraints of their laws).

Valan Luca's bow: "a knot-riddled branch broken from a cross-grained tree by a blind idiot in the middle of the night."

Laras...she really gets my motor running with that spoon.

But seriously, I picked Lanfear because there was no personality requirement in the question. Looks and personality - Aviendha.

Who needs flying and trains/cars?

I always kind of wondered about this too. Wouldn't it make more sense just to have an area in every town/city where there are a bunch of gateways to different places, all tied off? Teleporting sure beats flying...

In LoC, Rand visits the school in Carhien in "A Taste of Solitude" to check on its progress. He thinks that a new type of plow that's being developed would be a good idea, and that he should tell Idrien to build it. But per one of Moraine's suggestions, he realizes he should go through proper channels and tell Berelain to tell Idrien to build it, unless he wants to undercut her.

Anyone notice that he promptly disregards that advice a paragraph or two later when he tells Kin Tovere to build his telescope? Maybe Rand likes Tovere enough to risk it, or perhaps this is just an RJ miss? Either way I thought it was amusing.

Kate's "MOH-gah-deen" always bothered the hell out of me - she was still doing that when Michael was properly using "moh-GHEH-dee-ehn." And I think I like Michael better simply because he was reading characters I identified with more. And there was less high-pitched whining about stuff.

That said, Frank Muller is super-awesome. The way he nailed Eldred Jonas always stood out for me.

Brandon's Mat lacks the hilarious subtlety that RJ's Mat had. I've come to terms with it though, and overall I think Brandon is doing a great job.

I think the thing that was most painful to me was the letter he wrote to Elayne. Are we really supposed to believe that a guy who knows the Old Tongue ("sifted whole out of those dreams") and has memories from hundreds (?) of brilliant people doesn't know how to spell?

I forget some of the details about this, but I believe it happened in TSR. Egwene is a n00b in tel'aran'rhiod, ends up jumping to the Waste and being spotted by Amys before jumping back to (I believe) Tanchico. Amys is somehow able to follow her without knowing where she was going. This seems a lot like Perrin's trick of smelling where a wolf is going, but as far as I know, the Wise Ones never knew this trick. Or was it that they were just not teaching Egwene everything?

"hawkers crying their wares"

"all stony planes and angles"

"everything seemed to happen at once"

"a grin that nearly split his face in two"

I have to say about KoD without giving too much away - Mat's arc towards the end includes some of the most awesome scenes, military and otherwise, in the entire series (up there with Gawyn and Galad getting pwned with a stick, Rhuidean, Dumai's Wells, Deathgates/Blossoms of Fire, and countless others). His interplay with Tuon is always hilarious.

And I have to throw some Elayne-bashing in here as well. She gets all indignant about hearing people say Rand will "put her on the Lion Throne," but does nothing to aid Andor when she hears Morgase is dead (which to her knowledge is decaying into civil war). Rand steps in and fixes the mess, reserves her crown from multitudes of plotting nobles, and positions her to rule. But before returning, she goes all crybaby when Mat won't let her borrow his property and undermines his authority in front of his troops. Hours after he saves her from the Gholam, she conveniently forgets and manipulates him into maneuvering the Sea Folk for her. That's just a small slice - she's a pretty awful person.

And don't worry too much about Perrin. He was great back in his Battle of the Two Rivers days, then got very unlikeable/emo, but his ascent to being super-metal in 2 books is stunningly awesome.