Star Systems in the Cosmere

[cosmeredoug_30]

First of all, sorry if this has been covered already in the past, or if this should be in the Q&A section instead, I wasn't sure. 

I recently got the star system art prints from Dragonsteel and they got me wondering about the stars mostly but also Roshar's planets.

They show the Taldain, Rosharan and Drominad systems with blue/white stars, while the other systems have red or yellow stars, which would generally be considered the type of stars necessary to create life. We know that Taldain's sun is invested and that the Drominad system has got stuff going on with the same shard investing Taldain. Not to mention, the Drominad planet names run on a theme, 'X of the Sun'. So, is it possible that the Drominad system has some sun-investing going on too, and if so, does the star colour indicate that the Rosharan sun may also be invested? I might be overthinking something that is just an artistic choice but I feel like Brandon doesn't make many artistic choices without a reason.

I was also wondering about the Rosharan planets. We have the inhabitable three within the asteroid belt, presumably connected to the three shards in the system. However, the other ten planets outside the belt are suspicious. They are all the same size and all seem to be equally distanced. Not to mention, there are 10, which we know has some significance. So are these planets somehow important or is it like Preservation's use of 16 to hint at the existence of the shards, just something Honor did as a little easter egg to the Rosharans?

[Treamayne]

On 5/27/2024 at 8:10 AM, cosmeredoug_30 said:

Not to mention, the Drominad planet names run on a theme, 'X of the Sun'.

Keep in mind that these star charts are products of Silverlight, and also done by an arcanist, not an astrophysicist - so the naming is thematically based on the star system they depict (or how the people writing them beleive the natives would name them, if they have no direct evidence) and the orbits are not actual depictions, but approximations as an overview. Much like:

Spoiler

Quote

Questioner

On the [star map, there are different systems.]

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Questioner

And there are constellations.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Questioner

But who’s looking at these constellations?

Brandon Sanderson

So it is from a specific perspective, that Isaac will someday reveal. He drew this at my request; this is from a frame of reference. But we haven’t told you what it is. The best guess is that it’s Silverlight. I haven’t confirmed it, but it is the best guess. The second best guess is Yolen. There are a couple things that people have guessed, but I haven’t confirmed which it is.

Footnote: The perspective is now known not to be Silverlight. The painting itself resides in Silverlight, but the perspective is from elsewhere.
Boskone 54 (Feb. 17, 2017)

 

I would not draw any significant conclusions from the details of these charts, except the most over-arching details (Taldain in a tidal locked orbit, Rosharan system with ten gas giants, etc.)

On 5/27/2024 at 8:10 AM, cosmeredoug_30 said:

just something Honor did as a little easter egg to the Rosharans?

The Rosharan system was created by Adonalsium pre-shattering, not by Honor (or Honor and Cultivation) which is not to say they could not have changed one or more things - but we have no evidence that they did change anything. However, the naming of the Gas Giants is likley to be influenced by Honor. 

Spoiler

Quote

Overlord Jebus

Was just the continent of Roshar created by Adonalsium or was the whole system created?

Brandon Sanderson

Whole system was created.

Emerald City Comic Con 2018 (March 1, 2018)

Quote

Questioner

What's the source of rubber on Roshar?

Brandon Sanderson

It's not very exciting, it is a tree. It's not an actual rubber tree, it is a Rosharan version of the tree. I actually had to think about this, cause silk doesn't come from the same place that silk comes from. And then, I'm just going too far. Silk I can at least talk about and I can name it seasilk, but for rubber I'm just like, it's a rubber tree. We'll just make it rubber. It's not petroleum based. That's gonna be a hangup on Roshar, that they don't have petroleum reserves in the same way. They are a planet that has only been around for 12,000, 13,000 years. And beyond that, there's the whole crem thing. They do have some sources of petroleum that are biological, or I guess it's all biological, but it's not, yeah. That's gonna be a problem for them, let's just say. Access to large petroleum reserves is not a thing you will find there.

JordanCon 2021 (July 16, 2021)

 

Many planets had life created directly, so an evolutionary tie to sun color, outgassed elements andother evolutionary mechanics are unlikely to apply (or not apply in the same way); and many planets that did not have life created directly were colonized by Worldhopping.

Spoiler

Quote

Questioner

Before the Shattering, were people already able to worldhop from Yolen to the other planets like Roshar, and so on?

Brandon Sanderson

It was possible, it did not happen nearly on the extent that it happens now. It's possible. I would say that, I don't know if there, yeah very very very few instances.

Prague Signing (Oct. 26, 2019)

Quote

mcase19

Are all cosmere languages derived from Yolish (like French and Spanish are to Latin) or did the Shards create them on their own?

Brandon Sanderson

Some peoples other than those on Yolen predate the Shattering of Adonalsium, remember. So no. But many others do share a common root.

Stormlight Three Update #4 (Oct. 3, 2016)

 

Hope that helps.

Edited June 27 by Treamayne
SPAG

[alder24]

1 hour ago, cosmeredoug_30 said:

First of all, sorry if this has been covered already in the past, or if this should be in the Q&A section instead, I wasn't sure. 

I recently got the star system art prints from Dragonsteel and they got me wondering about the stars mostly but also Roshar's planets.

They show the Taldain, Rosharan and Drominad systems with blue/white stars, while the other systems have red or yellow stars, which would generally be considered the type of stars necessary to create life. We know that Taldain's sun is invested and that the Drominad system has got stuff going on with the same shard investing Taldain. Not to mention, the Drominad planet names run on a theme, 'X of the Sun'. So, is it possible that the Drominad system has some sun-investing going on too, and if so, does the star colour indicate that the Rosharan sun may also be invested? I might be overthinking something that is just an artistic choice but I feel like Brandon doesn't make many artistic choices without a reason.

I was also wondering about the Rosharan planets. We have the inhabitable three within the asteroid belt, presumably connected to the three shards in the system. However, the other ten planets outside the belt are suspicious. They are all the same size and all seem to be equally distanced. Not to mention, there are 10, which we know has some significance. So are these planets somehow important or is it like Preservation's use of 16 to hint at the existence of the shards, just something Honor did as a little easter egg to the Rosharans?

Taldain's star is a "blue-white supergiant" (per AU, which is clear on the star system art), while Rosharan sun is in fact bigger and younger than our Sun, which would make it white. I would assume the color doesn't say anything about Shards or investiture, but just like in our world, it's an indication of its size, temperature and type and Brandon does know a little about astronomy, his assistant Peter minored in it. Rosharan and Drominad's stars are comparable in size so I would guess they are type F or A main sequence stars (which are whitish), while our Sun and the Scadrian star are type G stars.  

Spoiler

Leiyan

I'm curious about the sun because it's described as white, and our sun is typically yellow. I assume it's a different type of star?

Brandon Sanderson

The yellowing of our sun is not actually caused...so our sun being yellow is not based on the star's actual color.

Leiyan

So is it bigger than our sun? Smaller? If there's anything you want to throw out there I'll take it.

Brandon Sanderson

Okay...I'm having to reach into my memory. This is not canon. Younger and larger, I believe it is both. Younger and larger.

Brandon Sanderson

The star's age, at Roshar...Earth astronomers would say that is a star which could not have planets with life on them.

Words of Radiance Philadelphia signing (March 21, 2014)

 

Spoiler

 

[cosmeredoug_30]

On 5/27/2024 at 2:58 PM, alder24 said:

I would assume the color doesn't say anything about Shards or investiture, but just like in our world, it's an indication of its size, temperature and type

I did kind of figure it was probably just this, I just had a tinfoil hat moment because Taldain and Drominad have a common shard and also both have white stars so then the crazy connection to the Rosharan star popped into my head lmao

On 5/27/2024 at 2:58 PM, alder24 said:

star's age, at Roshar...Earth astronomers would say that is a star which could not have planets with life on them.

This is giving me nore tinfoil hat theories! Has Brandon said anywhere that he went with the star because of fantasy physics, or would this still potentially indicate that something investiture-wise might be going on with the star, allowing it to support life on the Rosharan planets? Maybe there's some surge of gravitation stuff happening, allowing a star that wouldn't normally support life to do so?

On 5/27/2024 at 2:15 PM, Treamayne said:

Rosharan system with ten gas giants, etc.)

Also, I didn't realise the ten planets were gas giants. I know the fact that there are ten is probably important but if they're gas giants then - stormlight being a gaseous form of investiture - could the gas giants be made up of investiture? 

[Argenti he/him]

19 minutes ago, cosmeredoug_30 said:

This is giving me nore tinfoil hat theories! Has Brandon said anywhere that he went with the star because of fantasy physics, or would this still potentially indicate that something investiture-wise might be going on with the star, allowing it to support life on the Rosharan planets? Maybe there's some surge of gravitation stuff happening, allowing a star that wouldn't normally support life to do so?

On 5/27/2024 at 9:15 AM, Treamayne said:

The issue is more with lifespan* and radiation, which Ado pretty easily solves. If you put it there, life doesn't evolve, so the shorter lifespan of A and F sequence stars is less of an issue. The higher radiation could be just the higher investiture, which heals radiation damage pretty easily, and the fact that most things are crabs, which are resistant to radiation. 

 

*Of the star; A and F stars live for much shorter.

Edited May 29 by Argenti
Clarification

[cosmeredoug_30]

7 minutes ago, Argenti said:

most things are crabs, which are resistant to radiation. 

Huh, I didn't know the thing about crabs, might give some more explanation for why the listeners/singers evolved to have carapace?

11 minutes ago, Argenti said:

The higher radiation could be just the higher investiture

Sorry if I misunderstood but are you comparing investiture to radiation or saying that investiture is counteracting radiation? If you're comparing it to radiation then that kind of makes sense to me. I think I read somewhere (not quite sure so I might be wrong) that the Shards, while they have a specific location, are also sort of omnipresent, the investiture that makes each shard up existing everywhere, so that's similar to cosmic background radiation right? At least it would be a cool parallel. CMBR coming from the Big Bang, investiture coming from the breaking of Adonalsium.

If you're saying investiture is counteracting radiation then ignore all that and I have no idea!

[Argenti he/him]

Just now, cosmeredoug_30 said:

Huh, I didn't know the thing about crabs, might give some more explanation for why the listeners/singers evolved to have carapace?

Sorry if I misunderstood but are you comparing investiture to radiation or saying that investiture is counteracting radiation? If you're comparing it to radiation then that kind of makes sense to me. I think I read somewhere (not quite sure so I might be wrong) that the Shards, while they have a specific location, are also sort of omnipresent, the investiture that makes each shard up existing everywhere, so that's similar to cosmic background radiation right? At least it would be a cool parallel. CMBR coming from the Big Bang, investiture coming from the breaking of Adonalsium.

If you're saying investiture is counteracting radiation then ignore all that and I have no idea!

I meant the latter; being in a higher investiture environment like roshar helps eliminate pesky things like cancer and colds. However, background Investiture is also a thing, that is how magic systems form on worlds without shards. It's rarer, but can still happen.

[alder24]

4 hours ago, cosmeredoug_30 said:

This is giving me nore tinfoil hat theories! Has Brandon said anywhere that he went with the star because of fantasy physics, or would this still potentially indicate that something investiture-wise might be going on with the star, allowing it to support life on the Rosharan planets? Maybe there's some surge of gravitation stuff happening, allowing a star that wouldn't normally support life to do so?

This isn't about supporting life, it's about the star's age - Rosharan system was created by Adonalsium around 13,000 years before the events of WoK. That's a really young star - too young for life to evolve on its own, not to mention form planets in the realistic way. That's why Brandon said what Earth's astronomers would say about the star. They would say the same about Scadrial or Nalthis. But Adonalsium could have just handwaved any real problems and created an already stable star with stable planets in stable orbits.

Spoiler

Overlord Jebus

Was just the continent of Roshar created by Adonalsium or was the whole system created?

Brandon Sanderson

Whole system was created.

Emerald City Comic Con 2018 (March 1, 2018)

 

Spoiler

Questioner

What's the source of rubber on Roshar?

Brandon Sanderson

It's not very exciting, it is a tree. It's not an actual rubber tree, it is a Rosharan version of the tree. I actually had to think about this, cause silk doesn't come from the same place that silk comes from. And then, I'm just going too far. Silk I can at least talk about and I can name it seasilk, but for rubber I'm just like, it's a rubber tree. We'll just make it rubber. It's not petroleum based. That's gonna be a hangup on Roshar, that they don't have petroleum reserves in the same way. They are a planet that has only been around for 12,000, 13,000 years. And beyond that, there's the whole crem thing. They do have some sources of petroleum that are biological, or I guess it's all biological, but it's not, yeah. That's gonna be a problem for them, let's just say. Access to large petroleum reserves is not a thing you will find there.

JordanCon 2021 (July 16, 2021)

 

3 hours ago, cosmeredoug_30 said:

Sorry if I misunderstood but are you comparing investiture to radiation or saying that investiture is counteracting radiation?

Roshar is a world with a lot of investiture everywhere and that means Rosharans are more invested than elsewhere. Being more invested and having a lot of ambient investiture improves Rosharan's immune system and fastens healing. 

[+Oltux72 he/him]

On 5/29/2024 at 5:58 PM, cosmeredoug_30 said:

Huh, I didn't know the thing about crabs, might give some more explanation for why the listeners/singers evolved to have carapace?

It would seem to me that they have evolved to lose their carapace.

Or strictly speaking modified rather than evolved. The system is very young, but the organisms show similarities you would expect from phylogenetics. Either Adonalsium copied them from elsewhere, or, and here things are getting weird, as an entity with access to the spiritual realm took the potential outcomes of evolution in a Rosharan environment from the spiritual realm.