My Take on Surges and Orders

[Crysanja]

i wonder about thouse orders in general.

 

are they a human thing or are they depending on the spren(s) you bind or even a law of nature?

 

can you bind just one spren, or more?

 

 

does one spren typ reflect one order and their abilities?

so if you want to be a windrunner(like Kaladin) you have to bind a honnor spren

 

 

if it is compleatly dependend on the spren you bind, i see big problems, there are so many different spren, more then there are orders.

 

 

can you loose youre bond spren?(think this happend to Szeth)

-> what happens to youre abilities?

 

 

edit: dont want to post again =) - just wanted to say thanks windrunner =)

Edited July 13, 2013 by Crysanja

[Windrunner he/him]

I'm going to preface with that, unless I quote Brandon somewhere, everything I'm saying below is just my theory, and not necessarily the truth.
 

i wonder about thouse orders in general.

are they a human thing or are they depending on the spren(s) you bind or even a law of nature?

It kind of depends on the way you look at it. There are going to be ten different ability sets granted, one set to each order. So, it is, in a way, natural for those people to form distinct subgroups, the orders. Even some of their symbols may be innately tied to the magic. But they're still groups of people, probably organized by the Heralds or maybe Nohadon.
 

can you bind just one spren, or more?

I would be highly surprised if this was possible. From an out-of-world perspective, that would make characters able to be way overpowered. In-world, I really think the spren are attracted to your most dominant attributes, so you'd bond with a spren most compatible with your character. For example, if you're someone who is very resolute, but you more often think and act on protection and leadership, you'd become a Windrunner and not a Stoneward. I think it could be possible with Hemalurgy.
 

does one spren typ reflect one order and their abilities?
so if you want to be a windrunner(like Kaladin) you have to bind a honnor spren

Yep, I think that's exactly how it works. If you want to be in Shallan's order, you've probably got to bond one of those symbolheads/cryptics/truthspren. Although, she seems to have attracted more than one, so we'll see how this goes. Perhaps she's formed a bond with the one she spoke to in the very end, the one she confessed to about her father's murder.
 

if it is compleatly dependend on the spren you bind, i see big problems, there are so many different spren, more then there are orders.

I just don't think all spren are able to form Nahel bonds to grant Surgebinding. There are clearly spren at completely different power levels. Compare tiny little lifespren to windspren or riverspren, who can take human form and perform small acts of magic as pranks. The Nahel spren are just even more powerful than that. I wouldn't be surprised though, if
WoR Spoiler

Parshendi forms could be taken by bonding with just regular spren

 

can you loose youre bond spren?(think this happend to Szeth)
-> what happens to youre abilities?

Well, we know spren can be killed.

 

QUESTION
Can spren die?
BRANDON SANDERSON
Yes, spren can die.

 

I imagine if your spren is killed, or if you start acting against the ideals that bonded the two of you that the spren might leave you, and you would lose your ability to Surgebind, for the same reasons I outlined in my last post. If you remove a Hemalurgic spike, you lose that power. However, I don't believe that Szeth has ever been bonded with a spren. There have been vague hints that something else is going on there.

Hopefully, this helped to provide you with at least one perspective on these questions

[Shardlet he/him]

I honestly don't think that there is any sort of innate predisposition to Surgebinding apart from the obvious behaviors that attract a spren. I believe the way it works is that the spren itself acts as a sort of non-invasive Hemalurgic spike, grafting an ability onto someone's Spiritweb when they never had any abilities before.

 

You know, I really like this idea.  I like the thought of heroes who receive powers by virtue of their character rather than by inheritance or by prophecy (i.e., the chosen one).  Virtually anyone can receive powers and the determining factor is the direction they have taken their lives and the key attributes of their character.  It's cool.

[11thorderknight]

Can someone refresh my memory: was there ever a Brandon quote that there are ten abilities shared by ten orders, or ten Surges? It sounds like splitting hairs, but somewhere I read Brandon saying that to get an order you combine two small symbols and one large symbol. Basically, what I'm getting at is whether two adjacent orders that share a Surge will be able to do the exact same thing with that Surge, or whether they'll each use that Surge in a slightly different way. In other words, is order 10 going to be able to fly and walk on walls the way Kaladin/Szeth can, since they share Gravity, and order 2 be able to bind objects together using Pressure? Or is each one going to do something unique with those Surges?

Edited July 14, 2013 by 11thorderknight

[Shardlet he/him]

I honestly don't think that there is any sort of innate predisposition to Surgebinding apart from the obvious behaviors that attract a spren. I believe the way it works is that the spren itself acts as a sort of non-invasive Hemalurgic spike, grafting an ability onto someone's Spiritweb when they never had any abilities before.

 

You know, I really like this idea.  I like the thought of heroes who receive powers by virtue of their character rather than by inheritance or by prophecy (i.e., the chosen one).  Virtually anyone can receive powers and the determining factor is the direction they have taken their lives and the key attributes of their character.  It's cool.

[Crysanja]

if it is realy about attracting spren, and a special type of them, then most of the world does not like thouse "divine" actions now.

it feels like vorinism trys to keep the ppl away from getting magic powers.

 

if vorinism ideals would attract special spren, then we would hear alot more about magic(lots and lots of ppl atracting them).

but the only active magic we hear about, is the old magic and the use of fabricals.

 

so either there is another requirement to bind a spren, or they all do the wrong stuff.

 

what is special about Shallan and Jasnah?

[Shardlet he/him]

There were too many KR back in the day for it to be any kind of uncommon for people to attract the spren necessary to receive surgebinding abilities.  I refuse to believe that Kaladin was the first person in the last however many hundreds or thousands of years to behave in such a manner as to attract an honorspren.  I think that seven years ago old things began to be active in the world again.  The death rattles began about seven years ago.  Gavilar began to change about seven years ago.  The world is in a state of flux where former things are re-emerging.

Edited July 15, 2013 by Shardlet

[Crysanja]

hmm with other spren i would agree with you, but with honor spren?

 

just think what is/was honorable in asia and japan - for some part it is compleatly different in the western world.

 

interresting point - is it enough that you think you do something honorable, or when it is precived honorable, or has it to be honorable from the sprens view.

 

 

atleast for the highprinces a honorable lifestyle seems very odd if not crazy.

 

 

but i agree there must be some other factor. too many ppl that it does not happen a few times.

in addition there seems to be some odd way to get powers like Szeth.

 

maybe the desolation must be starting, but this would make it very odd for the Radiants, because they would loose power between desolations and would disband.

Edited July 15, 2013 by Crysanja