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DRAGONMOUNT

A WHEEL OF TIME COMMUNITY

solarz

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Posts posted by solarz

  1. On 11/27/2019 at 1:26 AM, Dagon Thyne said:

    In the prologue of TGS, when the farmer is discussing the coming Last Battle.  He notices that an apple tree which had died and had no fruit was suddently full of fresh, plump apples, unless I misread the entire prologue.

     

    You can't really tell if a tree has died or not until it starts rotting away. The farmer probably assumed the tree was dead when it was just dormant.

  2. Without the Aes Sedai, humanity would have been wiped out during the Trolloc Wars.

     

    Actually, scratch that. Without the Aes Sedai, humanity would have been destroyed by crazy male channelers long before the Trolloc Wars happened.

  3. 15 hours ago, Carebear Sedai said:

    Because up to AMOL Min had no real aspirations or direction in life beyond fulfilling Rand's wants and desires.

     

    She literally complained (mostly to herself) for 4 books about how she was being jerked around by fate and loving Rand was not something she was planning on doing. I'd say that's plenty of personal aspirations right there.

     

    The difference between her and Elayne is that Min put aside her own desires in order to help Rand save the world. In this aspect, she is very much like Rand himself.

  4. On 6/27/2008 at 4:43 AM, Blackrose said:

    After re-reading the series and all the 'extras' i though that it was the Nym who  did the song along with the Dai'shain Aiel, the nym were a construct of the power? and iirc the Green man is the last of the nym.

     

    anyways as luckers explained LTT had nothing to do with the aiel as he basicly did the 'sports' fencing etc. Aiel and ever the tinkers dont use a sword as its is a man made construct which serves only the purpose to harm another person. so LTT would pick up a sword if he was dai'shain

     

    Meh, thats my two copper's worth

     

    Not really. Belal referred to fencing as a "harmless sport" before they learned how to kill with it, so presumably it did not violate the Way of the Leaf.

  5. On 10/29/2019 at 9:05 AM, agreddon said:

    Didn't Brandon say that Rand didn't know the song and that the Tinker's wouldn't have been able to learn it anyways, though?  I saw that as being just a little bit over the top.

     

    The Tinkers forgot their history. This was revealed in the Rhuidean vision in book 4.

     

    In the prologue of EOTW, LTT asked if Ishamael had "the Voice", which is basically the human version of Treesinging.

  6. The Forsaken are feared because they are evil people who can channel. Men who can channel are feared because they become crazy people who can channel.

     

    Who would you fear more, an evil mafia boss, or a crazy psychopath? For most people, there's little difference.

  7. The Tower does a lot of things that defy common sense, like restricting the age of novices even in the face of dwindling numbers. These things all have a reasonable basis, but they become unreasonable when circumstances change and the AS refuse to change the way they do things.

     

    This is due to several factors:

     

    1. Aes Sedai are long lived. Most AS are over 40 years old, many are over 80. As such, they are naturally resistant to change.

     

    2. Aes Sedai are ruled by the Amyrlin and the Hall, and both have to fight each other to get anything done. Keeping the status quo is the easiest thing for the two to agree on, so that becomes the path of least resistance. Aes Sedai have always stayed in the Tower until they are called on to help, unless they are assigned as advisors, so that's what they keep doing regardless of whether it makes sense or not.

     

    3. The Black Ajah actively works to undermine and corrupt the WT. Who knows how much they shaped the Tower's policies over the millenia?

  8. Keep in mind that the length of the borderlands is about the length of continental US, so imagine from the Atlantic to the Pacific and that's how long of a border they need to cover.

     

    The real world equivalent of Aes Sedai would be artillery pieces. Can you imagine trying to defend that much territory with only a few hundred pieces of artillery? 

  9. On 9/19/2019 at 3:43 PM, Kalle alTear said:

    My biggest thing that I didn't like about the books is that every single couple lived or died together. If one died they both died, if one survived they both survived.  That kind of stunk because it's not realistic  on top of that I was robbed the joy of finally having Faile die. I hated her from the first moment she appeared in the series and spent the whole series hoping for her (hopefully extremely painful) death.  I was so hopeful after she was captured by the rouge Aiel.  But sadly no. Then during the Last Battle it looked promising too.  But once again I was robbed of it because Perrin lived (which is good that he did).  So we never got to see someone from a couple grieve the death of their partner. Well except Egwene but she died epicly soon after. 

     

    That is just a result of Sanderson trying to tie up all the loose ends.

    - Siuan and Gareth dies: fulfills Min's vision

    - Tenobia and Bashere dies: allows Perrin to become King of Saldaea

    - Gawyn and Egwene's death: ties up Egwene's arc, and likely by popular demand

     

    If Lan had died, that would probably have warranted a whole chapter on Nynaeve grieving and dealing with it.

  10. People can say what they will about RJ's verbosity, BS is still the series' greatest weakness.

     

    Sanderson has two major failures:

     

    1. Trying to tie everything up in AMOL only

    2. Mischaracterizing Mat

     

    Although books 12 to 14 were supposed to wrap up all the plot lines, BS was still opening new plot hooks in books 12 and 13. The Slayer arc went on too long, and Perrin was wasted in AMOL as a result. The Black Tower arc was also unnecessary. Mat should have finished rescuing Moiraine in book 12, and the final two books should have been devoted exclusively to the Last Battle. This would have given us a much more believable ending.

     

    The mischaracterization of Mat is just too difficult to overlook. Mat has always been a pivotal character in the series, and to have him mischaracterized is to excise a part of the series' soul.

  11. 56 minutes ago, Camlen said:

    This, among some of the other things have begun to make me question the dark one's intentions.

    I get that "evil is self defeating" but what if it's more than that.

     

    Semirrhage was, for instance, reportedly ordered to send shadowspawn to fight shadowspawn in Tear. This isn't self defeating, this is rather intentional.

     

    What if the Dark One was the Victor, not because he succeeded in destroying the pattern or because he swapped with the dragon, but because he acheived what he set out to achieve in raising Rand.

     

    The way the DO communicates to Rand after he touches the shade of shaidar haran is almost like that of a teacher in the way that he criticizes rands attempts.

     

    Perhaps the last battle is the dark one's way of repairing the bore himself, entrusting only a worthy adversary to wield those powers necessary without ruining creation. 

     

    Think of how much the Dark One's servants pushed rand into the man he becomes. In the portal worlds and in egwenes accepted test we see a world where the two Rivers is never attacked and Rand eventually succumbs to the dark one's taint. If he really wanted to deal with Rand then he would have simply ignored him and let his very existence destroy him.

     

    For some reason the dark one needs Rand to be the dragon.

     

    No, all jests aside, the point of AMOL is that the only way for the Dark One to win is if all of humanity voluntarily turned to him. In other words, so long as one person resists him, the Dark One has failed to achieve victory.

     

    It might sound like a tall order, but remember that he has an eternity to work on it.

  12. 3 hours ago, SinisterDeath said:

    Well, what I was getting at, was the possibility of Ishamael engineering his success against the Trollocs, to Further Hawkwings renown/fame, so that he could further manipulate the guy eventually leading to the creation of the Seanchan.

     

    I would say that's more his plan B. If he could overrun humanity with trollocs, he absolutely would.

  13. 8 hours ago, SinisterDeath said:

    Just had a thought..

     

    Given what we know about certain Forsaken actions... I wonder how much of Artur's success against Trollocs was engineered?

     

    Doubtful. Ishamael only went to Hawkwing once he finished his conquests.

     

    Throughout the 3000 years, Ishamael's actions were designed to slow down or even regress mankind's progress. If his trollocs could have defeated Hawkwing, he could have started a second trolloc war.

     

     

  14. To put it simply, the Borderlands exist because everything north of them has already been consumed. Case in point, see Shienar.

     

    The Borderland nations have no leverage over the southern nations. They cannot just "let some Trollocs through", because those Trollocs will just raid and pillage borderland villages.

     

    We have some examples of such dynamics in real world history. During the Warring States era of China, more than 2000 years ago, the Kingdom of Zhao held the northern barbarians at bay. That did not prevent the other six Kingdoms from fighting each other or fighting with Zhao.

     

    The fact is, from the end of the Trolloc Wars until the beginning of The Eye of the World, a period of some 2000 years, Trollocs were a relatively minor threat. Artur Hawkwing fought an army of Trollocs and crushed them, even as he proceeded to conquer the borderlands along with every other known nation.

  15. Myrddraal can sense channeling. They are used in the ritual to forcibly turn channelers to the Shadow, where 13 channelers channel through 13 myrddraals. They have otherwordly abilities and can bind Trollocs to their will.

     

    I think the idea that Myrddraal are those trolloc spawns that would otherwise be able to to channel if they were human makes a lot of sense. However, I don't believe they were "exposed" to the OP or TP in the womb, no more than human channelers are "exposed" to the OP while in the womb. Instead, they are simply "throwbacks" to the human stock, and their otherwise affinity for channeling is twisted into their Myrddraal abilities.

     

    Thus, a Trolloc that gives birth to a Myrddraal in a stedding would simply have a Myrddraal baby.

  16. On 9/26/2006 at 10:08 PM, Wonga said:

    Perhaps I should have been clearer, I meant in the first book.

     

    I first noticed the affection after Shadar Logoth, when Nynaeve was pissed about being noticed.

     

    I saw Nynaeve being annoyed at being spotted, then Lan hesitating when they freed Perrin and Egwene. The next I know they're in the blight and announcing how much they love each other.

     

    Maybe I'm just dense, there just seemed to be nothing before that. It seemed like RJ has thought 'oh, I need a relationship! Those two will do!'

     

    I'll take your word for it about her growing on me...

     

    (Bolds are edits.)

     

    Sounds like you missed a lot of subtle hints about their growing attraction to each other.

     

    My advice is to just take it in stride and keep reading. The Wheel of Time is not meant to be read just once. The Eye of the World, especially, is a pleasure to read the second time around. You will certainly pick up all the subtle hints then (and not just about Lan and Nynaeve!).

  17. On 9/10/2008 at 3:21 PM, Jambo said:

    From NS we know that Moiraine heard the Fortelling about Rand, and she has a very in-depth knowledge of the Prophacies, so how come when she got to the Two Rivers she wasn't able to pick out Rand as the Dragon Reborn? I mean if she was able to narrow it down to him, Mat, and Perrin just based on their birth dates, should she not have been able to narrow things down further? If people were willing to talk about the boys' birthdays you would think it wouldn't be that much extra effort on Moiraine's part to ask if perchance one of them were born outside of the Two Rivers. It wouldn't take a genius to figure out that 'Gee Tam al'Thor was in the army fighting the aiel, and when he finally came home he had a son with him, and when the son was grown up he looked just like a flaming aiel!'

     

    So you've got a boy born within the proper timeframe, born outside of the Two Rivers, and he looks like an Aiel, how much more obvious could it have been? Part of the Prophacies are fullfilled right there. I don't know if there were some other factors at work that prevented Moiraine from seeing the obvious, but to me it seems like she came close to dropping the ball.

     

    No, it was not obvious at all. You only think this because you have hindsight bias.

     

    Moiraine had no inkling that the Dragon Reborn would be associated with the Aiel. Nobody did. Nobody knew anything about the Aiel except that they were crazy badasses.

     

    People in Emond's Field knew Tam left the Two Rivers when he was young and came back with a wife and a babe. That's it. Nobody knew what Tam did, and most people did not even realize that Rand was born outside the Two Rivers. Nynaeve knew it, and she lied to her. It would have been highly unlikely for anyone else to tell Moiraine Rand was born outside. Therefore, although Moiraine likely had suspicions, she did not have any proof. Rand looked different, true, but everyone said that was because his mother was an outsider. Just because Rand's mom was an outsider didn't mean Rand was born on the slopes of Dragonmount. That would have been a huge assumption to make.

     

    The Trollocs attacked only 3 places on Winternight: Rand's, Perrin's, and Mat's. Therefore, it was clear that the Shadow wanted those 3 boys, and what the Shadow wants, Moiraine opposes. It would have been the utmost folly for her to take only Rand based on her suspicions and leave the other two boys: what if she was wrong? The Dragon Reborn would have fallen into the Shadow's hands then.

     

    As Moiraine is wont to say: "The Wheel weaves as the Wheel wills." The Pattern wove Rand, Mat and Perrin closely for a reason. If Moiraine had only taken Rand with her, and left Mat and Perrin to be killed or captured by the Shadow, then the world would have been doomed.

  18. 1 hour ago, Ryrin said:

     

    Nynaeve thanked Myrelle for saving Lan. To save him, she needed to have sex with him. That’s why Moiraine transferred to bond to Myrelle and not anyone else. 

     

    I think that's debatable. While it certainly wasn't rape, Myrelle did take advantage of the situation.

     

    In any case, it's irrelevant, because nobody cared about the sex. It was the act of passing the bond that was considered a crime, because the Warder had no say in it.

  19. 2 hours ago, mistborn82 said:

    didn't the shadow use a full circle somewhere, Maradon maybe. As for warding shadowspawn @solarz I think you'd be better served trying to find an example from later books as the first two especially have various issues that would make something from them less than reliable

     

    If you're referring to warding the Shadowspawn, there is also a passage in The Dragon Reborn where Lan and Moiraine did not sense a warded darkhound. Lan also mentioned how Aes Sedai and Warders are not able to detect gray men.

  20. 1. The Last Battle Trollocs overran the combined might of the borderlands. Even if this wasn't as massive as the Trollocs War hordes, Egwene only had a fraction of the Light side's forces.

     

    2. Aginor hasn't been around for 3000 years, yet the Shadowspawn self-propagated just fine. We did hear about the Darkhounds, there was an army of them at Shayol Ghul.

     

    3. Yes, Shadowspawn can be warded to avoid Aes Sedai detection. In The Great Hunt, one such draghkar almost killed Moiraine.

     

    4. The light side had access only to a handful of "renegade" Ashaman. The Shadow had the bulk of the Black Tower And the Red Veils! There were around 100 Black Ajah Aes Sedai, so the Shadow could have fielded 3 full circles of 72, while the Light side would barely have been able to field one.

     

    5. Trollocs and Myrddraal can't Travel, but Dreadlords and Red Veils can. While the Light side *could* have used Traveling to make hit and run attacks on the Shadow, we never see this happen.

     

    The point is, the LB could have been made much more exciting without needing to add the Sharans.

  21. 9 minutes ago, SinisterDeath said:

    But none of those, aside from Trollocs, are a massive Army.

     

    You have Ishy and what's her face, corrupting the Seanchan, who end up working for the light, and then Demanodred coming out of left field, as the Sharan's Dragon, unknowingly fighting for the DO.

     

    The Last Battle would have less tension, and sense of dread, if not for that last army showing up.

     

    If he hadn't put them in, then people would whine about the darkfriends swinging back harder then they had any right to.

     

    In the Trolloc Wars, a united White Tower with more powerful Aes Sedai could not hold back the Trolloc Hordes, yet Egwene and her broken Tower could run roughshod over the Trollocs? The Seanchan knew to deploy assassins against the White Tower, why didn't the Shadow deploy warded draghkar and gray men?

     

    The Shadow had both Black Ajah and Taim's Ashaman. They also had the knowledge of the Forsaken. A circle of 72 would have outgunned anything the Light side could have fielded.

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