Lightweaver Ideals/Truths

[The Night Brigade he/him]

I know that there is some controversy on what ideal/truth shallan is on as a lightweaver and which truth gives what power and things like shardblades and plate. I have recently been thinking about this and I came up with the theory that the order of the Truths doesn't matter but the strength does(other than the first ideal). What this means is that a lightweaver who says their second truth might gain shardplate while another lightweaver says their second truth and they only gain something like extra control over soulcasting let's say. This is because the first lightweaver said a very powerful truth but the second said a weaker truth. I feel like this explains how shallan has a shardblade when we know that other lightweavers don't even though they are on the same or similar ideals. Also, if I am not mistaken I believe that Brandon said that lightweavers have something else weird about their ideals other than the fact that they speak Truths rather than a personalized aspect of a general concept. Feel free to give feedback, this is my first theory so I'm open to suggestions on how to theory craft better.

[alder24]

30 minutes ago, The Night Brigade said:

I know that there is some controversy on what ideal/truth shallan is on as a lightweaver and which truth gives what power and things like shardblades and plate. I have recently been thinking about this and I came up with the theory that the order of the Truths doesn't matter but the strength does(other than the first ideal). What this means is that a lightweaver who says their second truth might gain shardplate while another lightweaver says their second truth and they only gain something like extra control over soulcasting let's say. This is because the first lightweaver said a very powerful truth but the second said a weaker truth. I feel like this explains how shallan has a shardblade when we know that other lightweavers don't even though they are on the same or similar ideals. Also, if I am not mistaken I believe that Brandon said that lightweavers have something else weird about their ideals other than the fact that they speak Truths rather than a personalized aspect of a general concept. Feel free to give feedback, this is my first theory so I'm open to suggestions on how to theory craft better.

The simplest answer is that Shallan had a Shardblade before the third Ideal because that was always Testament, not Pattern. It looks like all instances of Shallan summoning a Shardblade in WoK and WoR were with Testament. When she killed Tyn, Pattern was busy calling her men, so she had to use Testament as a blade. When fighting against a Chasmfiend, Pattern had a moving illusion attached to him that was also talking (she was on the other side of the chasm, illusions had to move there and by this time she could have done this only by attaching it to Pattern, the same with is with talking) so Kaladin had to have Testament as a blade. Everytime Shallan summoned a Shardblade in WoR she manifested Testament.

Speaking more powerful Truths won't unlock higher Ideal powers as those come from the Nahel Bond itself. The higher Ideal you are, the stronger the bond is, the more powers you get. You get a Shardblade because your bond with a spren is strong enough to allow them to manifest in PR. You get a Shardplate because your bond is even stronger and you can manifest Lesser Spren as a plate, as they are Connected to your True Spren and to you. You can't really skip that progression because if your bond is strong enough to manifest a Shardplate it has to be strong enough to manifest a Shardblade. Soulcasting isn't locked by progression for Lightweavers (only the Surge of Division is locked among all orders of Radiants, Skybreakers unlock it at the 3rd Ideal, possibly Dustbringers too, but no other order has a Surge locked like this), Shallan had big troubles with mastering this Surge, her Ligthweavers are better at it than she is, but she still can do it, and as Formless she could do it really well - this is something that her mind prevented her from mastering (or Jasnah's teaching methods), not Truths. But the order at which you say Truths shouldn't matter - If Shallan was ready, she could have said "I killed my mother" as the 2nd Truth and it would work just the same as "I killed my father" - it's all about readiness, you decide what's harder for you to accept. 

RoW ch 21:

Quote

Though by far the most talented at illusions among her people, Shallan’s own abilities in Soulcasting had proven … erratic. Adolin had peeked in on her sessions to see only occasional lumps of grain. Other times, she accidentally created twisted things: flames, sometimes pools of blood, once a translucent crystal.
[...]
Though mastery of Soulcasting eluded her, she had improved over the year.

RoW ch 93:

Quote

She opened her eyes, strode up to the door, and grabbed the knob with her freehand. It vanished beneath her touch. Soulcasting really was easier on this side. The knob barely cared that she asked it to change.