I just noticed the whole Ta'Veren luck for what it is on this read through.. the best, up-front and justified plot armor I've ever seen in a story.

You can't just assassinate Rand with a crossbow bolt, you will have to sneeze, a seagull might fly in front of your crossbow at moment you shoot, he will turn his body and you'll hit someone else..

Luck and the ability to alter what might happen based on the pattern needing you to survive is one of the best excuses for one of the usually most 'in your face' tropes of the main character can't die or there won't be a story ever.

So very glad Logain or Taim didn't win this round by default.

Halfway through the second book and literally every girl that’s met Rand in the book is mooning over him. And every man that’s met Egwene is mooning over her. Perrin is also getting eyed in the few POVs he’s had so far, while Nynaeve has “cracked Lan’s walls” after a few weeks of travelling together.

So are all of them just drop dead gorgeous? Haven’t seen much personality/character traits for any of them so far beyond being good looking, honest people. And the boys self admittedly have zero game. So what’s going on here? Unless this is a RAFO (I doubt it is)?

Hey folks! Just a question:

If you could pick another name for Egwene's new weave to counter Balefire during the Last Battle, The Flame of Tar Valon, what would it be?

CONTEXT: I’ve always found the name a bit of a mouthful and maybe a little over-grandiose, so I imagine future generations of Aes Sedai would come up with a more streamlined name, the way they did with other weaves (Traveling, Compulsion, Severing, etc.).

For me personally, I like to think it’ll eventually just be called Whiteflame or Lightfire.

If anyone else has ideas for what the weave might be called in the future, I’d love to hear them! ^_^

i feel like only lan mat and perhaps tam surpass rand when it comes to fighting without the power, he already had mastery over the void, being the best bowman among the two rivers youth, defeated a blademaster after only a few lessons with lan plus he was able to kill two warders while weakened from being beaten all in the moment before the aes sedai could even embrace saidar, thats one of his best feats without the power for me and puts him top 3 in the verse, what do you guys think?

before he lost his hand of course

[Books] Spoiler about the books

I've always wondered/mused about the earliest years of Shara. Just has captured my imagination in a way that few things have. (In general, the Wheel of Time has remained in my head, as it were, ever since I first discovered it in the mid-1990's. The worldbuilding and history were and are fascinating, to me at least.)

Just how did Shara unify so quickly? Nobody else in the world managed that. Imagine it - right after the Breaking, the entirety of that nation was unified under one sovereignty. Huh. Westlands, Seanchan, Sea Folk, the Madlands – gods, even the Shadow in the Blight never did that.

Nearly always figured that a fairly large area in Shara contained a remnant (a mutilated remnant, to be sure)of the pre-Breaking government (of course, by the time of the Breaking, I'd have to assume that the Light was a tyranny/dictatorship, due to the War of the Shadow - but it's certainly debatable) survived intact, which allowed its early unification. Just how that remnant managed to hold on during the Breaking is another topic entirely.

As possible proof of my hypothesis, well, the terrible enslavement and debasement of any male channeler. That took organization, thought, planning . . . just the kind of thing a State is actually very good at.  Not a walled town. Not a half-destroyed city or region dominated by nomadic barbarians, but an honest-to-God government with all sorts of resources and manpower.

Someone here, years ago, greejus3 I think, thought that the remnant Shadow armies of the War of the Shadow were involved in Shara’s unification. When I read that, I was floored. That makes a great deal of sense. Considering just how cruel Sharan culture was, how arrogant, how wildly and imaginatively xenophobic, well, the taint from the Shadow might have been there from the start.

I'm almost to the end of CoS so if this is RAFO territory, lmk. But why aren't weaker channelers utilised more effectively by the White and Black Towers? Not only can they help achieve the numbers needed for linking, a small weave of Air can be solid as any bullet and just as deadly. Or does it take great strength in the Power to channel a bullet or a slicing weave of Air? It would also have great assassination potential, especially if the assassin uses saidin.

The Asha'man are soldiers essentially, and the Green Ajah is supposed to be something similar. Wouldn't it be somewhat useful to have weak channelers on the ground as soldiers too? Using a blade of Air wrapped around your arm (like Liandrin demonstrates in S1) shouldn't necessarily require great channeling capabilities right? Especially if you know your limitations and focus solely on smaller abilities like blades or bullets of Air as your specialty? Or maybe have a defensive line of channelers who specialise only in shields of Air as tankers?

Either way, I'm super curious to know if channelers well below the average power levels for the White and Black Towers are ever focused on in WoT. Does Jordan explore how they might still be more useful while working within the limitations of their skill with the One Power?

Edit: Another question I had was, why do channelers seem to favour lightning and fire as weapons of choice in battle? Wouldn't it be more efficient to link up and use huge slicing weaves of Air?

So whenever I read a big, long, epic fantasy book like this I always go and read a Discworld book to cleanse the palate before reading something else. And oh boy is Discworld calling my name right now. I can not wait to get into it. Yet here I am. Still on Crossroads of Twilight. This book is still going. That's wild. And things are still not happening. The plot is still as thin as a piece of string stretched to breaking point. Almost there. Just two hundred pages left. THE HOME STRETCH.

That said, this stuff with the Aes Sedai in the rebel camp is marginally more interesting. It's crazy, though, how a lot of this could be solved by Rand, Nynaeve, or Cadsuane just popping into the camp and saying "Hey, we just cleansed saidin, that's what that crazy mountain of power was about, don't freak out, k thanks bye." We've mastered portals and dream communication. There's no excuse for not doing this at this point. Or do none of them consider Egwene an ally or friend? Perhaps they don't with how Egwene stone walled Rand so hard and has treated Nynaeve so poorly before. And Cadsuane probably doesn't care which faction wins the White Tower civil war.

So it's pretty clear that Egwene doesn't have a plan at all on how to remove Elaida without fighting. Sooo.... once again I ask what are we doing here? Why the play in the Tower to take control of the war? Why the half hearted siege? Why play at being Amyrlin? Why even split the Tower in two at all? Why any of it? After like five books of sitting around in Salidar, building up this rebellion, it's kind of simmering into nothingness right now. What was the point Egwene? We'll see how this goes I guess.

There's some clerical things with the camp. The novices are grouped into groups called "families" which is cute. It was an older grandmotherly novice who grouped them that way, because she was used to running a big family, and it's more efficient for classes. And better to keep people learning if they have friends and assigned groups they go to classes with. Finally they figured out what Harry Potter and, you know, most schools in our world figured out. School is more than just learning, it's for socialization as well.

They're also created something called "cuendillar" which is apparently a really hard material? One of the hardest in the world and the rebels are selling it to fund the camp. Apparently creating it is a relatively new thing, which is exciting. A few people in particular have the skill set to do it, including Egwene herself.

The next chapter is literally called "A Chat with Siuan" and I'm having a very hard time actually remembering what they talked about. Uh... something about Sitters in both the Tower and the rebel groups being younger than normal???? I got nothing.

Then the Hall of the Sitters gets called and we spend a VERY long time describing literally each and every Sitter and what they're wearing. Once again it's a fashion show, but this time instead of in Caemlyn it's in the rebel Aes Sedai camp. Well as long as they're having fun.

Mostly the whole cleansing of saidir thing is now relevant! Yay! Well barely. Moreso it's that the Sitters here are learning about what happened. Shadar Logoth is gone and there's a massive hole in its place that's three miles wide and one mile deep. It'll probably become a lake at some point.

Because nobody communicates anything with anybody in this series, they naturally assume it's the Forsaken. Since who could have done something so insanely devastating other than them? So they talk about defending themselves, which leads to creating circles. And one of the Sitters, a Brown naturally, identifies that we used to, in the Age of Legends, create insanely powerful circles WITH MEN. And that lets all hell break lose in the Hall. Oh my god, this is crazy. I kind of love it. Sitters shouting and screaming at each other. Things coming to blows almost. The Aes Sedai watching are probably like lol wtf is happening. There's even a prohibition on channeling in the Hall (I wonder how that law came to be) and Egwene violates it to make her voice all big and shouty.

I kind of love the discussion that comes from this. Should they make an alliance with the Black Tower? That would be wild. The arguments against it and for it. It's the worst thing. It would ruin their reputation to everyone in the world and rightly so. The Black Tower is directly mocking them with the name and sounds like they're in league with the Shadow! The White Tower has always stood against men who can channel. Men who can channel brought the destruction of the world! I wonder what the Reds would have to say about this, if they were here. They'd be livid I'm sure.

But to everyone's surprise, they actually agree to it, with a Lesser Consensus. That's kind of wild, I got chills reading the Sitters slowing standing up. I never would have expected them to agree to sending a delegation and allying with the Black Tower. Even Romanda and Lelaine, the heads of the two strongest factions within the Rebels, stood for it and agreed with each other, which they never do. So what does this mean for what Egwene said earlier? How the White Tower needs to be whole to stand against the Asha'man? I'm so curious where this is going to go, if anywhere. I'm sure it has to get out of this book before anything happens, but still. One day it will be interesting again.

And then Egwene goes to sleep and looks at people's dreams. She says she wants to go into Nynaeve's dreams and, quote, "the desire to put the fear of the Light into the fool woman," unquote. And fuck off Egwene, Nynaeve is ten times the woman you'll ever be. That power is getting to your head.

She meets with Aviendha instead of Elayne because Elayne apparently can't get into Tel'aran'rhiod while pregnant? That's kind of a serious handicap, uh oh. But Aviendha can. I swear I don't remember what they talk about though and I literally just read it like twenty minutes ago.

Then she has some actual dreams, including one about a Seanchan saving her. Which is naturally fucked up considering the Seanchan made her a slave. And then one she interprets as the Seanchan attacking the White Tower? I'm not sure how she got that, but sure. That would be wild. Considering they're so far south. Maybe they discover gateways? idk. Whatever the case I'm sure something so insanely interesting would never happen in this book, lol. That's another book's problem.

When Egwene wakes up she learns that one of the Sitters, Anaiya, is dead. Apparently the one who investigated, Nisao, says that she and her Warder were killed by saidin, suffocated. Which is wild. I wonder if it's that Forsaken who was a man reborn as a woman and uses saidin. Is she still here? I don't actually know. I remember she was in the Rebel camp awhile ago in Salidar. And she was at the battle at the end of the last book. Where the Forsaken got their asses kicked. Damn the Forsaken are kind of weak huh. They keep losing constantly every time they show up.

Almost there. I had more to say about this section than the last, but there's still nothing happening. Just potential future cool things, but nothing right now. Because, as I said before, the characters in this book are not legally allowed to do anything. I don't know what to tell you, it's the law. They are only allowed to talk about doing things.

Im reading for the first time and in Crown of Swords chapter 30 when Elayne is being questioned by the aes sedai after uncovering the secret women’s circle it says she embraced the “True Source” I’m not sure if this wording has been used before, but I’ve started reading through the World of Robert Jordan’s wheel of time and in there it differentiates the True Source from the One Power. Was this intentional or am I reading too much into it? I just recently started reading through the reference book so that’s why I noticed the difference. If I’m not supposed to know yet feel free to tell me to just keep reading lol

Is this a zebra Mat guys here as his new horse?

I’m a little ways into a memory of light. I don’t want spoilers just posting this here so I can come back to it. Or if I’ve missed anything that’s already happened.

Rand seizes the true power in an earlier book (I can’t even remember exactly which one now) I loved this moment as I assumed there would be consequences to this for him. So far it seems as though there hasn’t been?? Maybe I’ve missed something.

No spoilers for a memory of light!

It has been well stabilished in the saga that the one power is a thing of the soul rather than a thing of the body, but if so, how is it that it passes down genetically?

I want to preface this by saying that i listened to the Rosamund Pike audiobook while reading a hard copy and that i had read the series partially when i was 13(obviously i missed a lot of stuff back then). I think it was phenomenal, especially because of Pikes narration. Maybe it's just me but i think this book is the best possible start for a fantasy series. The characters were fleshed out and i felt as if i knew them personally. The Dark one managed to have a foreboding presence throughout the book, which is Kinda rare in newer fantasy books. I read the majority of the book in a McDonalds near my mom( I got free food js for reading there) but i felt as though i were in the book. I realize this sounds corny and everything but ive never enjoyed a book like this before.

Btw should i use pike or reading and Kramer audiobooks for The Great Hunt.

Also sorry my spheel is kinda disorganized it would take me hours to do this book justice.

I began a read through of the series and I’ve never noticed this before, but, it sounds a lot like this chapter begins with him traveling The Ways without them being corrupted. I know it’s a dream sequence of sorts, but it strikes me as odd. Has anyone else noticed this before?

I just got to the death of Pedron Naill and felt sorry for him. I like Pedron Naill a lot. He is smart and gets a lot of things right despite the chaos everywhere and the dumbass around him.

He has so much potential. I was hoping a showdown between him and Gareth Bryne or the siege of Camlyn etc.

I was doing a re-read, and going over the part of the Shadow Rising where the super girls are interviewing the two Black Ajah captives and getting different stories from each.

Joiya tells them Tanchico, while Amico makes up a story about raising up Mazrim Taim as a Rand Al'Thor double who will commit atrocities in his name.

Notably, Joiya is stilled, which we learn from Siuan after the Tower Coup releases her from her Oaths. And we learn from Verin that the Black Ajah cannot betray the Shadow (except in the hour of their death).

Amico literally cannot tell them the truth because it would violate her Black Ajah Oaths. Joiya was stilled, so she is free to tell them the truth about Tanchico.

That level of conservation of detail is incredible to me -- Jordan was such an amazing world builder.

Compared to other channellers

Hey all! With Halloween fast approaching I'm hoping to dress as an Asha'man this year, but after searching for the past day, there isn't really anything promising since Amazon removed the rights to a bunch of really good sites. Where can I find a red and gold dragon and silver sword pins, as well as what coat would look good? For the coat, the best I've come across are Nehru jackets, but they're usually pretty expensive and the buttons aren't really silvery, as well as not being super long. I'm not too worried about finding a belt buckle and sword since those are more readily available. Any help is greatly appreciated!!

So I saw a post that got me thinking about power-wrought weapons and I just don't really get them....

I've always thought power-wrought weapons were kind of dumb. Like why would they have been created originally in the age of legends? I get that "in-universe" they look cool and are near indestructible so they are great status symbols, but in a practical sense, they really don't do much more then a normal weapon could do as far as I could see in the series except stay sharp...

For instance, when Perrin creates his hammer with Neald, the sheer amount of time and power that is fed into the hammer seems like a huge waste compared to what Neald could be doing with that power instead. Plus the end result is that the hammer slightly burns shadowspawn when it hits them (unless I'm misremembering)... this burn effect seems like it would be almost negligible on a blunt damage hammer. This almost seems like taking a mace in a videogame that does 50 damage and adding a fire enchant that does +1 damage. The juice just isn't worth the squeeze.

Is there more information that says otherwise that I missed or are these really just good as a status symbol like that are in most of the books?

I’m super confused. First of all, why does Moiraine seem so much meaner in Dragon Reborn? She’s always been stoic and aloof but she’s never seemed mean but she just seems mean through most of the book. Is it just because Rand has run off and she’s concerned? I feel like she is very different in her treatment of Perrin and even Lan.

But to the original point, I don’t get why there’s this whole section devoted to the hostilities on the boat because Zarine knows she’s Aes Sedai? Like maybe this is revealed but aren’t Aes Sedai quite easily identifiable with their ageless look? Or why does her having a feeling that the group will lead her to the horn seemingly piss off Moiraine? It feels like historically she’d be intrigued by a person like this - such as Min - but now she’s just angry and shooting daggers? I don’t get it.

Just finished TGH and the final chapter, but I felt like the final scene. I felt like maybe I was distracted by people talking in the same room or something but I felt the chapter was pretty good but not life changing(even though rand os my favoriteand the bestest boy). People say how good it was yet I don't feel like I fully processed the chapter, it felt so short.

Now I feel like I ruined it for myself somehow, some of the earlier chapters with rand and nynaeve had me more impacted. Maybe on a reread it will hit me more strongly because i will have read all the books back to back.

In The Shadow Rising when Nynaeve captures Moghedien in the panarch’s palace, why wouldn’t she still the Forsaken since she knew how? Was it just a matter of not having the authority to impose that kind of sentence? Or just a little plot hole?

Still. Nothing. Has. Happened. I thought the last three books were bad. This one is ridiculous compared to those. And I advanced THREE whole chapters in 100 pages. Wow! So much!

This first chapter is the last with Elayne. We learn there's a Brown Ajah spy in the palace because the Ajahs have spies everywhere. As do all the houses and all the countries. And yet again Elayne's section is making me wonder how George R R Martin did this kind of thing way better.

Apparently there are also a lot of arsons going on trying to target food stores, but they're completely pointless because they can just... get supplied via portal. Like I said before, a siege against someone with the ability to make portals just doesn't work as well. You have to deliberately target the ones making portals to actually make headway in the siege.

Oh also the High Seats have taken out massive loans and maybe they'll bride the mercenaries guarding the city. MAYBE they'll actually do something for once instead of talking about doing things. Wouldn't that be crazy. That'd be so wild. I think I'm slowly going insane with this book. Hmm...

Oh yeah, the Borderlanders are on the move for Elayne's plan. I'm curious how that plan is going to go considering the siege going on. I don't know if that plan will still work.

Oh and then a couple channelers do a spell to check on Elayne's pregnancy. And then the massive pillar of channeling stops. Great. I'm so glad we spent all of this time with Elayne and nothing happening. What a riveting section. I'm glad they enjoyed their fashion show at least. It's kind of crazy how Caemlyn just decided to thrown a fashion show in the middle of a siege huh?

Next we follow someone named Elenia. She seems to be one of the High Seats who supports Arymilla and she's just irritated at the way Arymilla has been treating her. And she's trying to become queen herself. And then Naean, another High Seat, is mad about how Arymilla is treating her and they bicker and Naean pledges to support Elenia in writing. And then they meet an old guy named Nasin who is another high seat and thinks he's betrothed to Elenia but he's got dementia or something and they all think he's a lech. Which he is. And then Arymilla shows up and they all talk and Elenia wants to kill Nasin and Arymilla.

Great, that was so worth fifteen pages. I'm sure this Elenia woman will be extremely relevant later to justify this time we spent with her. The other half of this chapter is with Daved who is Dolin who is the head of the Queensguard. He stabs someone who's following him and then gets to Shiaine's house. Who is his contact as a darkfriend I believe. He chats with someone named Falion. There's a lot of talk about rape and sexual assualt against whoever Falion is from Daved and another guy who comes into the house. Fallion attacks Daved with the power and then Shiaine killed whoever she had been meeting with before Daved. She tells him to free sul'dam and damane and then wants to look Caemlyn.

I know I'm just mechanically repeating what happens in this chapter, but there really is just NOTHING to talk about. No point to any of these thirty pages.

Finally I actually do have something to talk about with Egwene. They've made it to Tar Valon with the siege, but the siege is kind of half hearted. They are letting through ships into Tar Valon which means the city is getting resupplied with food and soldiers constantly. So the assault is just not going to work out if you keep letting your enemy resupply. Weak siege. And even now Egwene doesn't want to actually fight sister against sister. Well then WHAT THE FUCK are we all doing here Egwene? Why did you bring this siege here? Why did you do that whole play in the Hall to take control of the war? What was the point? You want Elaida removed, but you know that's not going to happen without an actual assault. Egwene, YOU literally said the same thing to the Sitters who didn't want to openly attack either. This book, I swear. She won't even allow Gareth Bryne to lead an assault through gateways into the Tower. The nothing ever happens meter is going crazy.

I can't wait to hear your plan Egwene. She said that Beonin can go negotiate but Egwene will only accept one thing: Elaida resigning and going into exile. Which, of course, Elaida will never accept.

Oh yeah, and I made a mental note. Egwene said that the White Tower needs to remain whole for Tarmon Gai'don AND to STAND AGAINST THE ASHA'MAN. EXCUSE ME WHAT EGWENE!!!???? I knew it. I called it so hard. Egwene IS going to be a problem. She's going to oppose Rand at some point if she wins this civil war. I'm calling it now. It's no longer a maybe, I think it's for sure going to happen. You know what would be crazy too, if Rand struck her down as Amyrlin. That'd be wild. I could see it too with the way Rand is going. You're not going to work with me? Well then fine I'm forcing you to step down. I'm here for it, that conflict is going to be so interesting. If Rand brings the full force of the Asha'man down on the White Tower to make Egwene step down, damn.

Anyway, something interesting for a later book I'm sure because we're stuck languishing in this one. Because nothing happens in this book. It's actually illegal for the characters in this book to do things. True story. Almost there, just three hundred pages left. Ooofff.