I was wondering what the Alethi, what kind of music they listen to?
They're gonna like stuff that sounds stuffy and snooty to you. So, the kind of equivalent would be a soft string quartet in our world. Granted, it's a little different there, but that'll-- Not much percussion. There is a time where they like a nice battle hymn, or something like that, you could get some equivalent of brass.
How did you develop M-bot?
M-Bot grew out of many different inspirations. I love quirky and odd robots and so you can go all the way back to some science fiction history and you'll find all my inspiration.
Is there anything about the Stonewards that you can share that's not a RAFO? I know they're coming later.
They are coming later, so not really. They were more of the Knights Radiant front line troops, as opposed to the Windrunners who were scouts. But you probably already knew that.
Did we see any possible Phone Company?
You haven't seen them yet, but they are still around.
When M-bot is telling Spensa and Rig about how much is written on human craziness, was he misleading them?
No.
Would Sunmaker's backstory... if you asked too many questions about his backstory, would you get RAFOd the crap out of?
Sadees? Yeah, probably.
Does Silverlight have any reflection in the Physical Realm?
RAFO.
Has Mraize ever Ascended?
RAFO. So it's not a yes or no. It's a yes or no or other.
Where do the lines point, exactly, when burning steel or iron?
Generally, right toward your center.
On the objects?
Oh, the objects. Center of mass, unless you are starting to get really good at it, whereupon you'll be able to kind of see a sort of spectrum that you can pull on and yank on.
Can the gems on Roshar store other types of Investiture?
RAFO.
I am subscribed to the, "Doomslug is the hyperdrive," theory. Can you confirm or deny?
I cannot confirm or deny.
What does Doomslug eat?
Doomslug eats mushrooms, among other things... I don't want to say anything more.
I know, I was trying to find something that wouldn't be RAFO'd
Yeah that's actually shockingly relevant of a question, so-- Hmm!
What would happen if you burned an Awakened metal?
I'll RAFO that for now. It's very, very rare in the cosmere. Something interesting would happen. We'll RAFO that.
Reen and Ruin, how much of the personalty that we saw in the books was Ruin, her actual memories, and how much of it was actually Reen?
Most of what you saw was this kind of weird amalgamation, because it's getting filtered through her memories and things like this. You can see mostly Ruin at that point, but there is some actual Reen in there mixed in. Maybe twenty-eighty. Eh, twenty five-seventy five.
If someone had a Hemalurgic spike and they burned aluminum, would the negation of-- am I going to get RAFO'd?
You're asking if it would destroy the Hemalurgic power? Burning aluminum at that point would not destroy the Hemalurgic power. It would pull the Investiture through whatever you're doing. It would blank your power, but it wouldn't destroy you being an Allomancer with the spike...
I actually considered this in building it and that would be too easy a way to remove Inquisitors, particularly if there were dissension between them.
Lift has lots of pancakes and you only describe six of them. I was wondering if you could tell me of any of the other three?
Okay, sure... One is a terrible, awful, seafood one that Rosharans would eat and I would hate, and people that I know would love. Not sure what the other two would be. Probably a very spicy one, a savory spicy one. Probably a vegetable greenish one, something that over here would look like it has spinach in it.
Is that different form the one-- she mentions one that has chopped vegetables in it?
Yes, that would be different. It would be a pure green one as opposed to one more like--
Like a fritter?
Yeah. Yeah.
Are we going to learn any more about Syl's past, and her former Radiant?
Yes, you will indeed learn more about Syl's past. And her former Radiant.
In The Stormlight Archive, are there any on-screen appearances of dragons in any form?
RAFO. Sorry.
Dragons can be shapeshifters, correct?
They can, yes.
Do they only have a humanoid form they can appear as, or can they appear as many humans?
Depends.
The ten gas giants, are they associated in any way with the Essences, the Heralds or the Knights Radiant other than culturally?
Only culturally.
Do the Tranquiline Halls and Damnation--do the Vorins associate them with the planets that they actually are related to?
They don't.
Roshar's moons, do they have special spren associated with them?
RAFO.
I have a theory that Hoid is actually, perhaps not the good guy we're led to believe? I think he's going to be the big bad guy.
Hoid would, perhaps, agree with you. As he says to Dalinar very clearly.
The rock that Vin has in the beginning of Mistborn--black obsidian rock. What was that? Was that--
That was a memento from an earlier part of her life.
Do you anticipate ever coming back to White Sand?
Yes, I do anticipate it, but no promises. If I do come back to it, it will not be the novel White Sand, it would be a sequel to the graphic novels.
Was Drephrast at the Shattering, and if so, did he play a part in it?
Those are RAFOs.
So you said earlier that color has a lot to do with things and in Warbreaker obviously color is like a big thing *inaudible*. Will that have a relation to anything else?
It will have relations to a lot of things, including the way The Way of King's magic plays out and works.
I'm writing a fantasy book that's like D&D. Do you have any advice for me? I'm about 6000 words.
A lot of great science fiction and fantasy have come from roleplaying campaigns. Not just Dragonlance, but also the Malazan Book of the Fallen started as a roleplaying campaign. And you will find this happens time and time again. Do understand that the things that you guys experience in your roleplaying session that are really funny are probably not going to be funny on the page, because they're funny in the situation, so you have to work on making the characters all work on the page, not as they work in your-- together. Make sure everyone's on board for you lifting and borrowing the stuff for your story. And make sure you don't use any of the Wizards of the Coast trademark things. For instance, you can't use Beholder. That's a trademark thing. But you can use zombies, because zombies are in everything. So learn the difference there.
But just have fun with it. Your job right now, as a newer writer, is just to write and practice. And that practice will teach you how you want to approach your stories as you move forward. And the more you you do it, the better you'll get at it. And the more you'll know what you need in order to make it better. And that can start from anywhere. That can start from a D&D campaign. That can start from a silly song lyric you hear. It can start from fanfic. It doesn't matter where it starts. The chore you have is to practice it and learn what works on the page, as opposed to what works in person.
When you started writing for Wheel of Time, did you find that any of your opinions changed when you wrote the characters, versus--
So, Mat was way harder than I expected him to be to write. I thought Mat would just zip out and be super easy, and I was taken by surprise by how difficult Mat was to write.
Cadsuane had always been my least favorite character, and I was surprised by how much I understood her when I had to stand in her shoes.
Is there any connection or coincidence to the Krell in Skyward, versus the Krell from Forbidden Planet?
Yes... Forbidden Planet is one of my favorite movies. Perhaps my favorite classic science fiction movie. I really dig any sort of Shakespearean interpretation in another medium. So I named the Krell after the Krell from Forbidden Planet.
Back to the callsigns. Did you come up with Jorgen's name first, or did you come up with his callsign first?
The callsign was first. And then the name followed out of some of the linguistics I was using... Yeah, the callsign was first.
What do you wish that you could have asked your favorite writers about writing when you first became a writer? And what do you think they would have said?
This one is easy. I would have said, "How do you finish your book, Mr. Jordan? Specifically: X, Y, and Z that you didn't put in the notes."
Otherwise-- You know, a lot of the things that you do as a writer aren't about what you ask other writers. And a lot of the advice you'll get as a writer won't work for you until you have written. So I wouldn't have known the right questions to ask them until I was struggling through that myself.
Would it make an Allomancer sick if they tried to burn pure silver?
As it stands right now, nothing would happen, because they would know if it did. Good question. Silver has some weird properties, but on Scadrial they are largely undiscovered.
Previously, you told me that Hoid loves bacon. Is there any other thing that you can tell me about Hoid that we won't be able to RAFO?
Oh man, I'm running out of stuff to tell you about Hoid that I can't RAFO because I get asked this enough that I forget what I've told people and what I haven't. I'm particularly fond of his monologue for the fourth book. So, be looking forward to that. It's a little different than the others.
In Skyward, what is your callsign? And what was the process for creating so many callsigns?
My callsign is Mr. Prolific. That probably wouldn't work as a good callsign, but it was my callsign way back when I was in my writing group, my first writing group with my friends.
The process was, actually, I wanted to pick a callsign that used the same sound as their real name, to help people keep them straight. Because you basically have a double number of names in the book. So same letter or same sound, creating it. And I just started with that letter or sound. And then I wanted them each to feel distinctive. If they're all, like, initials. Or they're all one-syllable names, it can be really easy to mix them up. So I wanted some that were two or three syllables. Some that, they wanted to reinforce who the character was sometimes, things like that. That's where I went on that.
The gems on Roshar, are they the same as the gems you and me know, or are they a byproduct of Investiture?
For the most part they are the same as the gems we know, which will ask the question, "Since most of them are chemically identical, other than color, what differentiates them?" and in the cosmere, color is very important, so I'll just leave you at that, but most of them are going to be gems like we have. If you took a ruby from our world to Roshar, it could be Invested by the highstorm.
And spren?
We will RAFO that for now.
In Alcatraz, he mentions a souvenir about a bullet that can pierce steel. Was that nod to Reckoners?
Yes, that's a nod to Reckoners. There's lots of them. If you read the Alcatraz books, there's an Asomedean joke, there's a Spook's street slang joke. The Alcatraz books, if you haven't read them, are kind of me practicing my improv skills as a writer. Every writer, I think, needs to have some measure of ability to outline, and some measure of ability to just "pants it," as we say. And the Alcatraz books, I write completely pantsed. I give myself a list of things that need to be in the book, and I try to work those in as I go. And that ends up with a lot of me making jokes about myself and my process.
Which character arc has been your favorite to write?
I usually don't pick favorites. Because all characters in all the books are like my children. But I will say it was extraordinarily satisfying to write Rand's arc, that I did in Gathering Storm. That was a true delight as a long-time fan of the series. So probably that one.
Do you find it harder to write from a male or female's point of view?
It is harder to write-- The more different someone is from me, the more difficult they are to write. Gender is only one part of that, however, and so some characters who are very like me, but maybe-- maybe a woman, would be easier to write than someone who is very different from me but is a guy. But that's all kind of part of it.
Early in my career, before I got published, I was actually really bad at this; but the main thing I learned from that era of my writing was that I was writing people to a role in the story. It wasn't that I was bad at writing women, it was that I was writing all women as the love interest. Which resulted in bad storytelling and flat characters. And if you start to be able to learn: treat each character they are the protagonist of their own story, treat each character like they see themselves, not as a bit part, but as the story themselves; and start to explore who they are rather than putting them in a role in the story, your characters will get better all around.
Is there anything more significant to Tien's obsession with rocks? Or is that just an example of him being a unique kid?
There is a little bit to the way he's seeing color in mundane things. It's less the rock, and more the things about the world he finds interesting. So I'm going to say it's the second. It's an aspect of who he is; the rock itself is not the important thing.
How many kings have had a Wit?
It is common for a king to have a Wit.
Has Hoid been more than just Elhokar and Jasnah's Wit?
He has been. Most Wits, historically, were a little more fool-like, more court-jestery. Wit does not think highly of that. But there have been others in the past that were more like what he would think what a Wit should be.
How are the floating cities in Ashyn held aloft?
By local magic... So basically, I can tell you how it works, because I'm not saving any secrets here.
One of the diseases gives this power. The reason it's called The Silence Divine is right now, the way I've devised it, is this power also causes hearing loss. So you have this virus that does this weird thing, but also gives you the power. And so there's a conclave of them, a chorus of them that keep the cities aloft. And that's why the book, if or when I write it, I guess it can't be a virus in this case. Whatever disease they have, someone develops penicillin and can potentially cause the city to come crashing down. That was the premise for me, but that means it needs to be a bacteria, not a virus but it needs to be a bacteria that stays with you long, so I have to work out exactly how I would make these diseases work.
Is there a spren for the Everstorm?
RAFO. Good question.
How many people, about, were sent visions by the Stormfather?
The Stormfather? It was less than ten. Fewer than ten.
Are there types of Investiture that the larkin can't consume?
Yes, I would say that there are, but it's going to depend on the state they're in. Pure Investiture, a larkin is always going to probably be able to grab, but lots of people can get pure Investiture. Kinetic Investiture they're are gonna have a good chance at being able to grab, but they can't get everything.
Do larkins have gemhearts?
RAFO. You can assume that Rosharan creatures have some sort of gemheart, generally. That is not 100% but you can assume it's a thing they'll have. But I will RAFO specifics.
Do the singers predate the highstorms?
The singers and the highstorms are-- The highstorms-- Let's say no. Trying to decide which one came first. They were created, right? But the highstorms were created as part of Roshar, as well. The highstorms predate humans arriving. Highstorms predate the Shattering of Adonalsium.
Has Hoid visited the Nightwatcher and received a boon?
Hoid has spoken with the Nightwatcher.
Is Sja-anat-- Is she wearing a chiton, like a Greek chiton?
I'll RAFO that.
When either Rashek or a Twinborn like Miles, how does he fuel his metalminds? Does he have to actually burn the gold in order to fuel them? Because, I feel like there's a paragraph in here where you kind of explained it, but I feel like you didn't actually say that you had to burn more gold in order to fill a metalmind. Is that how that works?
Yes. You can cross the streams and use one to power the other. But you are using the metal to power your Feruchemy instead of your own-- You're using, basically, the power that's coming through the metal...
So you do have to be burning one the whole time? Sounds good, good to know. So you could just infinitely fill it, basically? As you burn, you just use it to fill it and it just gets-- and that's where that comes from?
Yep. You are burning a metalmind that you've already filled, right? That's the key there. You fill a metalmind, then you burn that, and what that does is it keys the metalmind to the Feruchemy instead. Which normally no one can do because you could-
You can't do both.
Yeah. But if you can do both, you fill a metalmind, you burn that metalmind. What comes out of it is Feruchemical power instead, and you then are filling the metalmind with more.
So Allomancy is fueled by the power of the Shard. So what you're doing is you're powering your Feruchemy with the power of the Shard, instead of your own body. Using their Investiture instead of yours. Which is very dangerous.
Dalinar Ascends, right? Like, right then, there.
I have RAFO'd that. Whether he is Ascending or not is a RAFO.
Okay, because I know he kind of mentions from that, I don't know how to say his name but the older guy who has the Diagram--
Taravangian, yeah. Whether that deserves to be a capital "A" or not is a matter of argument. It can be disputed.
I guess my main question would just be Dalinar's now able to pull Stormlight and give it to people now.
He definitely can. That is a Bondsmith power, so.
That is a Bondsmith power, okay.
That is specifically a Bondsmith power.
Because my roommate was saying well, the Stormfather was surprised he could do that or was the Stormfather surprised that he was able to bridge--
He was surprised by what was happening to Dalinar as a whole.
Oh okay, that's what I thought because I was like, because I felt like the Stormlight, that power would be a Bondsmith power.
Let's say that the Stormfather and Odium were seeing something in Dalinar that, perhaps, the average person watching even who is knowledgeable about Surges would not completely understand... But he will be able to use that power and Bondsmiths in the past have used that same power.
