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1.4.11: What was up with the Forsaken at the Cleansing?

[Leigh Butler, Doug Stanley]

The Battle of Shadar Logoth was an unqualified rout for the Shadow. Cadsuane's little band of channelers not only successfully defended Rand and Nynaeve from half a dozen Forsaken, but gave the bad guys a fair ass-kicking while they were at it, killing one FS (Osan'gar) and driving off the rest. (We're not told what if any injuries the rest of the Forsaken sustained, but it seems safe to assume that at least a couple were wounded in the battle; it doesn't seem that any besides Osan'gar were actually killed.)

So what we'd like to know is this: why were the Forsaken so badly prepared for the fight that a bunch of "half-trained children" trounced them thoroughly? Why would Moridin have them all gate in willy-nilly, with no apparent plan of attack and no conventional back-up forces of any kind?

It's been suggested that Moridin caused the fiasco deliberately - that he purposefully sent in the Forsaken unprepared, either to teach them a lesson ("NOW will you work together, dammit?"), to whittle down their numbers, or because for some unknown reason he actually wanted the Taint cleansed.

However, this doesn't seem very likely, especially the last suggestion. There's no possible benefit to Moridin or the Shadow in general to have the DO's greatest revenge on the world (the Taint) erased and Rand and the Asha'man able to channel free from the spectre of madness and a rotting death. It's clear from the various reactions at the Coffee Hour that cleansing the Taint is a Bad Thing for the Forsaken.

As for the idea that Moridin was deliberately reducing the Forsaken's numbers, it's doubtful that Moridin is that stupid or wasteful - there are few enough of the Forsaken left as it is. While it's true that the Forsaken have always schemed against each other as much as against the good guys, the whole point of the "reining in" of the FS Moridin's been doing since his reappearance is to get them to quit the backstabbing and start being an effective group of evildoers. Moridin doesn't need to kill anybody off; he's already in charge. In the same vein, Moridin also doesn't need to set up practical examples of why the Forsaken should work together when he can simply force them to do so.

So if Moridin didn't set them up to fail, what's the deal?

Also, prior to that point, who would have thought that Aes Sedai and Asha'man would actually work together, linking to form circles? (Apparently mixed-gender circles hugely magnify the strength of the individual channelers.) How could Moridin have anticipated that Rand would let someone else use Callandor? Moridin also had no knowledge of Alivia, who outclasses Nynaeve, or of the impressive cache of angreal and ter'angreal Nynaeve and Cads had between them. [Dave Rothgery]

Finally, the way events fell out, the Forsaken didn't have any real way to formulate a plan. They didn't know when, where, or how Rand was going to make the attempt to cleanse the Taint; the only thing they could do was wait to detect gargantuan amounts of the Power being channeled, and go try and stop Rand from finishing the task.

Some other questions/objections:

A: In [TPOD: Prologue, Deceptive Appearances, 43], Moridin recalls the disastrous result the last time he tried to confront Rand directly (i.e. he died). It's clear he's not anxious to try that again anytime soon. As for fancloth, even if anyone besides Moridin knows how to do it, it very well may require time to prepare (creating and donning a full-body suit of it), time the FS didn't have. There is also Aaron Cote's suggestion that perhaps Moridin is having the same kind of problems with channeling that Rand is (see section 2.3.16), and that's why he was a no-show.

Q: Where were Semirhage and Mesaana?

A: Mesaana was playing hooky, and got severely punished for it. We don't know yet whether Semirhage did the same (and received the same punishment), or if she was busy with something else at Moridin's orders and thus excused (see section 1.4.12).

Q: Why not gate in a horde of Trollocs, or a gholam, or at least some Darkfriends?

A: Again, the FS had no time to plan, much less to gather together an army of Trollocs/Darkfriends and get them to SL. Without knowing how long it would take for Rand to do the cleansing, they couldn't afford to waste the time. As for a gholam, assuming that a gholam's OP-negating abilities prevent it from being able to use a gateway, there would have been no way to get it there [Eric Lesch].

Q: If circles magnify strength so much, why didn't the Forsaken form one?

A: Doug Stanley sums it up thusly: "Forming one circle would have been quite stupid, even if they were willing to do so. It's doubtful they could withstand an attack from Callandor even with a circle, and with Rand's forces broken up into several widely spaced groups, they would face multiple simultaneous attacks from different directions. The only defense, really, is to dodge such attacks, by running or gating, which is hardly feasible while linked."

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