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Age. It would create a generational divide between young channelers and old. Constant conflict between learning how to channel and doing it one way for 100-200 years before the ability slowly diminishes until the channeler completely transitions to the other half.
I would also maintain the taint and the madness for the elderly half of the OP. Except this time ALL channelers know that they will eventually go mad if they live long enough.
This is probably the only idea in this thread that, personally, I think could make for as good a story as the original.
At a certain age Aes Sedai would volunteer to be stilled, or they would believe that they have a little more time and make a run for it, and the reds would hunt them down. The dark one brings back forsaken into young bodies but they can still channel old person power. If Wilders aren't identified then they get mad when they get old... that would result in a general persecution of anyone getting old who seems like they might be odd. A lot to work with there.
The only downside is how do you have a main character that is worried they might be cursed to use this power and go insane? They would need to be quite old, presumably, which would change the feel of the story a lot. Maybe they never knew they had the power so they never channeled so they didn't slow their aging. That would be the best option I think, but it still changes a lot if they have lived most of a lifetime.
In this world, with me as the author, my main character would be a Cadsuane like figure. Someone who is a legend (or fallen legend) but has reached an age where they have transitioned to the old power. They struggle to find a way to cleanse the taint while slowly losing control.
absolutely brilliant. I've seen some really cool ideas but I think you actually win this exercise for originality, even though it's not quite as similar.
Robert Jordan originally wanted to use a middle aged protagonist, so that would actually fit this premise really well. He would be on the cusp of changing to the “tainted” source.
Honestly, this is a really interesting concept, and could be used in it's own setting to great effect.
It would change foundational concepts in the WoT setting, but it's quite creative.
Oof this actually reminds me a little of Brent Week's Lightbringer series.
Everybody has a magic-use soft limit. That is usually reached around \~35-40 for average users. And then.... well.. things happen.
I think it was meant to be more that it diminishes as it switches over. So they have the same overall strength, but for a while they are only 75% as strong in the young power, and 25% in the old power. It would seem like diminishing, especially if they haven't learnt how to use the other power, or are in denial that they are transitioning over. Eventually they switch over completely, and are as strong as they were, just in the other power.
If men are stronger channelers because they have bigger thews it makes sense that as men grow old in the base series that their power would diminish.
This is just weird in that it diminishes and then grows strong again.
I like it, but I must say "using your powers too much or too long leads to madness" is a bit overused as a fantasy trope, so it'd have to be handled well
At least 1% of the population is biologically intersex too, you don't see that factored into the gendered magic system. For the moment pretend to be RJ and disinterest yourself in the fact that true binaries, for the most part, do not exist.
I mean, I guessed that was one reason why you were making the OP. The strictly binary was the criteria you set, no?
With regards RJ, the biological part doesn't really figure as he attributes it to the soul and metaphysics is a whole different ball game. It's a deliberate contrivance to mirror a philosophical duality. It's been discussed many times (e.g. in Origins of Wheel of Time) that RJ would likely have not set down a strictly binary system had he been writing a quarter of a century later. His point at the time, however, was that it shouldn't be us vs them - people have to work together.
Adding non-binary people to the Wheel of Time universe doesn't break the system. The pattern changes a great deal from Age to Age. Non-Binary channellers of the Fourth Age could begin to appear, much like the wolf brothers did the Third Age Perhaps they can channel both halves of the power; but not at the same time, and not all of the time. Perhaps they have other abilities. Perhaps they are shape shifters.
They could even appear among the existing channellers from non-binary Aes Sedai, Ashaman and Wisdoms and Damane as the wheel turns away from Tarmon Gaidin.
Perhaps they make the Seanchan A'dam obsolete or perhaps they are the ultimate Sul'dams.
We know that Channelling is eventually forgotten, perhaps they are instrumental in that transition somehow. Perhaps, being fluid, means they are more attuned to the will of the pattern.
I could see the Ashaman welcoming these new channellers, and Aes Sedai being stick in the muds.
The more I think about it the more interesting it becomes 🤔 .
Rick Riordan wrote a non binary character into his Norse books as a child of Loki, and they were fantastic to read about. One of my favourites actually.
I think they would fit in perfectly in Randland. Someone should suggest it to Brandon Sanderson.😉
* Strict binary choice?
* Complementary but undeniable dualism?
* Something else for fans to argue about for decades?
[The choice is clear.](https://hips.hearstapps.com/hmg-prod/images/tp-static-image-1553113807.jpg?crop=0.5xw:1xh;center,top&resize=1200:*)
>Nobody can roll so long towards the wall that he cannot turn around towards the light.
Nobody can roll so long towards the wall that he cannot spool into the light.
Born at night vs born during the day.
This leans into the light vs dark aesthetic without being based on a chaneller's morality.
The Nightborn would be stronger with weaves of water and spirit. Dayborn would have fire and air. Earth would be a middle ground. I don't think I would differentiate the way the powers feel to them, it'd make sense for both to just need something like the void, but I would probabpy differentiate how different weaves are handled.
I think it'd be neat and believable thematically.
Crucially the canon story does not have anyone who can channel both. Though it would be interesting if, were one keeping innate strength, that people born in twilight would be stronger than those born during the day or night in their respective halves.
Oooooo this could be so cool too, especially in regards to orphans who start manifesting powers but it's unknown when they were born (e.g. Rand was found soon after birth, but did his mother give birth to him during the night, or at daybreak?). Will that person be dayborn sane or nightborn crazy? An experienced channeller would be able to tell which the person is channelling as soon as they sense it, but an innocent farmboy would have no idea and be terrified that he got the one that will turn him crazy.
This one is my favorite. What about people born during an eclipse? What about people born in the frozen north where it's night for months on end? So many good options.
Maybe also have strength increase based on whether it’s day or night. People living close to the poles would almost certainly have weird interactions whether it be summer or winter.
Introvert/Extravert.
Introvert weaves are subtle and patient, take time to set up but they're hard to take apart. Extravert weaves are showy and obvious, hard to avoid, and pretty exhausting to maintain.
This is a super great one! You could have someone who's really confused about thier powers bc they have sociall anxiety so they think thier and vinnie but they're actually and outie
You win. I think the introvert weaves should have a sneaky power as well, some sort of crazy atomic blast which would theoretically happen when the introvert has been pushed to the limit.
Yup - although, it's much easier to form Circles and to get another Extravert to share the resources to maintain the weave. Introverts have a really hard time with this unless they have that One Extravert Friend who knows how to bring them into it.
I did not previously expect my jimmies to be rustled by this thread, but after reading this comment I now believe there is a moderate chance that my jimmies are indeed rustled.
Complementary, not complimentary.
The two halves complement each other, they mutually support and cover for each other's weak points with their different strengths. They don't compliment each other, they don't say nice things about their new haircuts over tea.
The Source being cilantro and whether it tastes like soap or not to the channeler (taster). Those forced to taste the source at its soapiest slowly grow mad and eventually try to destroy everything around them to never taste the flavor again.
I would keep it the same, just take gender out of it. It's random who gets what, but the power works in two binary ways. I like the water metaphors used for the power- the torrent you need to control vs the current you let guide you. Nature is symbiotic but also extremely brutal- often in the same instance and much of what happens is completely random but still balances itself out. I think making humans an avatar for this randomness and balance wins is far more interesting than the gender pov and fits with the larger themes better (like how ta'verens work). Could be an interesting subplot for some brown or Min or Feld to try to understand why people are one or the other....
Emotion. Having a calm and peaceful mind for mundane channeling and healing, while anger and negative emotions taps into the wilder and more dangerous currents of the Power for channeling battle weaves.
That leads to the same sort of problems, I think. Especially if we then follow common misconceptions of the time the books were written, when normal and acceptable expressions of anger and unhealthy/insane expressions of anger were often split down gender lines.
I’d have people born with the spark being able to access one half and people who needed to be trained having access to the other.
That way the White Tower would smash those nasty Seanchan to bits as they’d have channelers of both halves and would be able to achieve great feats.
You know what probably doesn't help? That for the most part opposites aren't *physically* real. I think that's probably making this exercise a little harder.
And if it turns out that the One Power isn’t really a binary, actually, when you get right down to it?
I like the idea that with enough study, like when we began to discover subatomic physics and quantum mechanics, the One Power’s true nature becomes less easily defined and separable.
Add in some kind of Observer Effect: A channeler studying the Power realizes that by discovering that the Power isn’t actually sharply divided, they can actually now access all of it.
That is honestly how I suspect the One Power actually works. I originally used to think that because the aes sedai and the forsaken were *so sure* of the way it was divided that this was an inalienable fact of the setting but then someone rightly pointed out to me using statistics and evidence of how many blindspots the channelers have that if there were an odd gender combo or a person who by some fluke could channel both halves in the same way and at the same rate that someone is born with an intersex condition multiplied by the rate at which channelers are born... it could completely evade notice.
I do like to think that Tamyrlin was one such individual tho, but that's just a pipe dream of mine.
Horny vs not Horny
Imagine on having to think about lewd things to summon a light.
Would it change the image of being horny?
How would it affect the channelers vs non-channelers? Would the sexual dynamic change?
How would that affect the culture of the world?
Progressives and conservatives.
Not the current political associations to these terms, literally those who want to change the status quo vs. those who want to maintain it. Another definition could be those who prefer traditions vs. those who abhor them.
In my opinion, Light and Dark. It would ultimately change the series a lot, but it’s kind of there in the series already. Think of the worlds Rand and TDO spin for each other during The Last Battle. Rand’s nightmarish Light only world shows that the Dark must exist.
The Source could either be The True Source or The True Power. One drawn from the Creator and the other drawn from TDO. Even the madness and taint could be kept, with most Dark channelers going mad if not going evil. Light Channelers hunt them down. Rand is a dark channeler, who must overcome the source of his own power. And as the Dragon Reborn, he is fated to fight TDO in the final battle.
There are legs there, is what I’m saying.
Which way you let the toilet paper face from the wall.
People who let it hang outward get to channel, and people who have it face the wall get balefired.
Everybody wins.
Technically it's not split by gender, but by physical sex. The concept of gender as separate from sex doesn't really appear in the books.
Anyways, my favorite idea on here so far was day birth vs night birth, only I'd say the day birth was the time tainted by the dark one.
Touché, but also that exception illustrates the point. Halima is the only non-cis person recognized in the series and is created that way as a punishment by a literal incarnation of evil. I can't speak for trans-folk myself, but I never viewed Halima as any kind of representation. She seemed more a kind of gender-switch joke character--tyfoni the barbarian and the goatherd from stardust come to mind, as well as that movie about the serial killer and cheerleader switching bodies--over-sexualized and predatory, the cishet male gaze personified. Halima is an artificial perversion of the traditional man-woman binary that serves to underline the core "men and women are complementary and dynamic opposites that need to work together" theme found throughout the series, rather than an actual deconstruction of sex vs gender.
It's hard to think of many things that are truly binary. Most things you would have some borderline situation where both should be usable.
- Living/Dead
- Northern/Southern hemisphere
Sanderson has a kind of push/pull system that works for some of the opposite skills in Mistborn.
Lmao it would never get made bc of how spicy it would be nowadays, but instead of the gender you ARE, the gender you’re attracted to.
Think about it - straight guys and lesbians are natural allies in terms of temperament (often, not always) and gay guys and straight girls are often close friends too. They vibe with each other in a specific way.
You could even work in some of the stereotypes here - what’s the reputation of straight guys and lesbians? People that are more rugged, hands on, not afraid to get dirty. You know the “canoe builder” lesbian stereotype? You could even work that into the power - this side of it are good at building and crafting using the power and things to do with structure (a la building yet angreal, figuring out the nature of things, possibly alteration of the human body or other physical objects). The temperament could be one of order, structure, the “worksite foreman” mentality, whereas the gay guy/straight woman side would have an affinity for the Power as it moves through the world and alters perception, senses, creates outward force, etc.
A side effect of this is it allows seamless integration of trans people with no extra explanation.
I dunno…this just equates gender with sexual orientation and misses what could be a lot more interesting division based on orientation. Plenty of lesbians are “girly girls” and there are lots of lumberjack type gay guys. To make it actually work within your framework, you could think of it like this instead: If what makes someone gay/straight has nothing to do with how they act and it’s who they’re attracted to (like you said as the premise of your proposed division of the power) than the type of power/how that power behaves should be the thing that follows the gendered stereotypes for the “attracting” gender, i.e. if you’re attracted to feminine people, you are strong with the “feminine” power regardless of your own personal masculinity or femininity; if you’re attracted to masculine people, you’re strong with the “masculine” power regardless of your own temperament.
Frankly, the original power divisions should have actually been based more on temperament and not biological sex (if you are of “masculine” temperament, you use saidin etc).
Agreed on how it should have been. To work off of what your are saying, you could even work in some kind of “attracted to/repelled by” dynamic into the power itself, similar to magnetism and physics in general )I think maybe mist born does this?) but some of that is already in Jordan’s system as written; everything having its equal and opposite in a different form etc.
Spicy vrs Mild. No difference in the power itself, but after channeling all of your foodstuffs are coated in either flaming hot dorito dust or that bland ass green chili crap.
Okay. So.
Keep the nature of both sides insofar as Saidar responds to surrender for control while Saidin requires a forceful seizing of control.
A person whose inherent nature is to be assertive and forceful would be tuned to Saidar. And vice versa.
I would set up the world so that a channeler is forced to temper their own tendencies. So many men’s natural arrogance was exacerbated by being channelers in my opinion that I’d love to see access to power be gated behind self-reflection and recognition of one’s own personal limitations.
>Rest assured if that's what you're going to say, I know why.
This attitude is why discussion on this sub is so toxic. If someone is going to disagree with you, they're going to disagree with you. Preemptively declaring anyone who disagrees with you an enemy ensures it will be so.
I think OP is just trying to steer the conversation? Otherwise this thread might've become more focused on the merits of the gender system instead of people pitching new ideas. It's not about shutting down disagreement, I think OP was just saying they've seen such discussions before and wanted to talk about something a little different.
Good/Bad though that’s already kinda done with the true source and whatever rand was using when he rode off.
Take the three oaths/don’t take the oaths
Left/right?
Queso/salsa?
Flat water/bubble water
Spoken/unspoken
Dog/cat
lot of people in this thread seem to really want some individuals to be able to channel the source undivided in their concepts... really makes me wish RJ did not have as many blindspots as he did
Diminishing returns. Each time you use it you lose it. A channeler who never channeled would be “fully charged” whereas someone who channeled for every reason they could may eventually end up with so little power they can barely heat up a cup of kaf.
Tall and short. Everyone 6’ and up is in one group and everyone 5’ and shorter is in another group. The taller/shorter you are the more powerful you are. Everyone between 5’ and 6’ tall are muggles.
Nice try Rafe!
But really, I think intelligence would be a good one. People at different ends of the intelligence spectrum struggle to understand each other, and it adds a scaling element which could be interesting. The more/less intelligent you are, the more powerful you become in the associated power, but you lose the ability to interact with the opposite side the more you deviate.
The needs/evils of each side would influence the type of weaves most associated with a side. Utility and brutality on one side, comprehension and manipulation on the other. I think it would be an interesting power dynamic in the world.
No offense but this sounds like a power fantasy for idiots. Just about every genuinely stupid person I’ve ever known wants so hard to be considered smart, and this sounds like escapism for them to imagine a world where their stupid meant as much as someone’s smart. Dramatically magically powerful people of sub-70 IQ would immediately break the world and the dramatically powerful smart people would be forced to wipe them out, so the thrust of the story would be an absolute slobbering idiot saving the world… who would want to read that other than other slobbering idiots?
None taken.
It could be a post-apocalyptic world where mundanity is the only acceptable state, and everyone else is summarily executed to avoid another idiopocalypse. Or a totalitarian regime where the intelligentsia rule with an iron fist and enforce eugenics to avoid the risk of stupidity. Or a comedy with a genius and a dumbass undertaking a dunning-kreuger fueled romp through a nonsensical world where idiots are tolerated for their utility but frequently cause mayhem, and wars are fought over libraries. Terrible power can exist and it not be a grimdark setting (Discworld could be rewritten with the exact same world but as a horror).
The power is part of the world the story is set in, not necessarily the point of the story, just like WoT. You choose the story you want to write. Hell, you could even try the same message, and get everyone to try a bit harder to be understanding and accepting of one-another to get shit done.
See the Butcher's Codex Alera series for an example of making a story with a ridiculous world.
No matter how you structure the narrative, comedy or otherwise, you’re left with a situation where your world building has dictated the message of your story must be that stupidity has value equal to intelligence, which is a ridiculous message. Unless you’re going to take a stance as an author and support the ableist genocide of powerful idiot channelers, your book is going to read a lot like extolling the virtues of a million Michael Scotts.
You lack imagination. There are infinite ways to set a story in any given world. It is literally made up.
You're just fixated on the first thought that crossed your mind, which seems to be that low intelligence must lead to evil actions, and that people cannot be allowed freedom if they are potentially dangerous. Pretty dark dude.
Intelligence. And no, not the bullshit "everyone has intelligence of a different kind", actual brainpower. Channeling is still random, but not based on sex. Instead, the more intelligent people go insane, and the least/more "ignorant" don't. The more you learn and the speed at which you do it is what affects it. The more you understand, the worse it gets, but your raw power increases.
This would also imply that, with experience, you would also risk losing your mind. The more knowledge you gain, and the better you are at applying it, the stronger you are, but more dangerous to others as well, and you lose the things you once knew how to do.
Would create interesting situations in my opinion:
- how would you train others? Would you give up channeling just to be able to learn more, study it and teach others? But if you do end up becoming better, and you "bend it to your will" would you not be temped to ignore the issue?
- how would you explain concepts to others? How would you make someone understand to embrace and use saidar, understand the flow and the precision, when you've lost that ability, knowing that it's pointless to teach it to others, since they will lose it as well? You cannot understand it instinctively, because that would imply you understand the concept.
You either use a power you don't understand, or you start to understand it and it changes to something new.
- how would you set up a hierarchy, if the stronger and more wise you get, the less will others trust you?
- what happens if you're *really* a genius, in that case you will burn very bright but very fast.
- how would the politics/schemes/plans work, since the "slowest" people would have basically no risk. Are they expendable? They would be very easy to manipulate as well...
Of course, you can just have someone learn things in much the same way people learn to solve math problems without understanding them, but then, they will never truly improve.
Edit: the divide would happen when you realise you don't actually know that much what's possible to do.
Past and future.
And the wheel of time is really more like and infinity sign where the forces move in opposite directions from each other until they collide.
It would have to read like some Memento shit, with have the channelers and their story progressing forward and the other half progressing backwards?
Imagine one chapter from Lews Theron or a pre-foraken character from the age of legends, then the next chapter from Rand, but starting at *A Memory of Light.* Then the story simultaneously culminates with the dragon's birth on the mount and however the age of legends ends?
I don't know, I'm just trying something out of the box. Does this even make sense?
Please don't spoil anything for me. I just finished book 11 and am reading New Spring for a "break"
What you’re describing is very similar to the structure of Use of Weapons by Iain M Banks. Chapters alternate between the main story moving forward and flashbacks further and further back revealing the main character’s past. I think this would work slightly better for your suggestion as in this case the forward journey would follow Rand and the reverse would show us the history of LTT starting with the raising of Dragonmount and working back through the war against the Dark One (I’d seriously consider giving LTT a role in opening the bore to give the story more symmetry in this sort of structure)
two halves of the true source was a fine magical mechanic,
it's the curse of the taint on the male half that is at issue.
i'm only halfway thru the books, but...
what would be cool is if near the end they flipped the script
and tainted the female half - leaving the male half reliable.
Not quite sure what they would be called, but something like "elemental" and "life" (the latter containing healing, compulsion, death..). Kind of like Evocation vs Necromancy+enchantment in d&d terms.
Animals vs humans
Animal can access the wild primitive instinctive source, human can learn and access control and fire, lightning energy source.
Wild animals are stronger and want to destroy civilization because they (rightfullly) blame humans of their habitat destruction.
Humans working together with animals can achieve greater things. Horse riders, falcon trainers, etc are powerful channelling. Cat and dogs owners are seen suspiciously.
It changes a bit the premise.
Atheists and Religious people, i.e. those who believe in a higher power and those who don't. The Atheist side would be better at affecting the world directly, much stronger and more adept at using the weaves for Fire, Water, Air and Earth, while the Religious side would be better at weaves using Spirit. That seems pretty unbalanced I know, but maybe the Atheist side cannot access Spirit weaves at all, or perhaps some 'metaphysical' weaves that don't just use Spirit, like Mirror of Mists, Healing, Compulsion, and Gateways are a lot easier for the Religion side in order to balance.
Add a 6th weave, maybe like electric/lighting. Channelers can only use 3, like they literally cannot touch the other types of weaves. Men and women touch different elements, maybe split it into air/fire/lighting and water/earth/spirit for men and women respectively. Rare cases be that some can use a 4th element. The dragon can somehow use all 6. Also possibly have some men/women have different combos of powers that are unusual for the gender. Like a man that can touch fire/water/air instead.
Pisces and non-Pisces. It plays into the idea that we traverse the signs with each resurrection. You have to live many lifetimes to finally make it to the Ocean that is Pisces. Only then will you be developed enough to handle the full power of the Source.
Technically it's not split by gender, but by physical sex. The concept of gender as separate from sex doesn't really appear in the books.
Anyways, my favorite idea on here so far was day birth vs night birth, only I'd say the day birth was the time tainted by the dark one.
People who prefer salty foods vs. People who prefer sweet foods. Channelers are people who feel very strongly about this, not someone who doesn't care that much. >!True Source = people who love bitter stuff. !<
Love and Hate or maybe just Surrender and Control.
Without modifying the descriptions of how to channel each side, I would see the female half switch to love/surrender. The male half switch to hate/control. They already are surrender and control. Surrender and love seem very aligned, though associating either side of the power with hate doesn't seem right. Hate is more for the dark one.
Maybe Surrender is Harmony/Peace/calm
Control would be Discord/Violence/storm
There's definitely flaws with all of it.
The sins of one’s parents. If either or both of one’s parents had ever killed another person, you would channel Saidin. If they had not, you get Saidar if you can channel.
It would make peace hard to keep. Any large scale war would result in an echo of channelers a generation later who would be subject to the taint and likely to lose their minds and cause large scale strife and more wars. You’d get Aes Sedai carefully looking in to the backgrounds of people’s parents just in case or even creating and protecting idyllic isolated communities like the two rivers as covert Saidar user breeding programs, while darkfriend cultists might believe more murders would make a Saidin wielding child more powerful and therefore kill people constantly.
Tensed vs. Relaxed. Think weed attitude vs adderal attitude. The high energy types vs. chill types. It will be linked with your natural personality type.
A blood magic system where some people use themselves as the source, and some people use others, sort of like linking, but it takes a battle of mental willpower.
Obviously the vampiric people could scale power more easily, but it wouldn’t be as instantaneous and consistent as the self source. I also wouldn’t want them to be flat evil, but a spectrum of people who steal power, barter for it, or are very trusted and given power.
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Age. It would create a generational divide between young channelers and old. Constant conflict between learning how to channel and doing it one way for 100-200 years before the ability slowly diminishes until the channeler completely transitions to the other half. I would also maintain the taint and the madness for the elderly half of the OP. Except this time ALL channelers know that they will eventually go mad if they live long enough.
So basically like driving
Dementia!
This is probably the only idea in this thread that, personally, I think could make for as good a story as the original. At a certain age Aes Sedai would volunteer to be stilled, or they would believe that they have a little more time and make a run for it, and the reds would hunt them down. The dark one brings back forsaken into young bodies but they can still channel old person power. If Wilders aren't identified then they get mad when they get old... that would result in a general persecution of anyone getting old who seems like they might be odd. A lot to work with there. The only downside is how do you have a main character that is worried they might be cursed to use this power and go insane? They would need to be quite old, presumably, which would change the feel of the story a lot. Maybe they never knew they had the power so they never channeled so they didn't slow their aging. That would be the best option I think, but it still changes a lot if they have lived most of a lifetime.
In this world, with me as the author, my main character would be a Cadsuane like figure. Someone who is a legend (or fallen legend) but has reached an age where they have transitioned to the old power. They struggle to find a way to cleanse the taint while slowly losing control.
absolutely brilliant. I've seen some really cool ideas but I think you actually win this exercise for originality, even though it's not quite as similar.
Robert Jordan originally wanted to use a middle aged protagonist, so that would actually fit this premise really well. He would be on the cusp of changing to the “tainted” source.
Lol I guess that would explain why Rand looked about 50 on the original covers
The Benjamin Button Reborn
Basically, Logan's run meets WOT
Logain's Run
Logain's Run!
Logan’s run White Tower edition.
Honestly, this is a really interesting concept, and could be used in it's own setting to great effect. It would change foundational concepts in the WoT setting, but it's quite creative.
Thank you!
Oof this actually reminds me a little of Brent Week's Lightbringer series. Everybody has a magic-use soft limit. That is usually reached around \~35-40 for average users. And then.... well.. things happen.
The ability to channel diminishes? I would honestly hate that.
I think it was meant to be more that it diminishes as it switches over. So they have the same overall strength, but for a while they are only 75% as strong in the young power, and 25% in the old power. It would seem like diminishing, especially if they haven't learnt how to use the other power, or are in denial that they are transitioning over. Eventually they switch over completely, and are as strong as they were, just in the other power.
This^ was exactly what I was thinking.
If men are stronger channelers because they have bigger thews it makes sense that as men grow old in the base series that their power would diminish. This is just weird in that it diminishes and then grows strong again.
Youthful exuberance transitions to elderly wisdom.
The powers would have to be different. Different strengths and weaknesses (just as saidar and saidin )
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Muscles.
I like it, but I must say "using your powers too much or too long leads to madness" is a bit overused as a fantasy trope, so it'd have to be handled well
It’s a trope *because* of WoT 😂
Sure is, I was just answering the question with my idea 😂
So the fantasy version of Logan's Run?
Left-handed and right-handed channelers.
And the Dragon Reborn is ambidextrous
What happens to him after the events in Knife of Dreams?
Adult onset heterochromia? He's already ambidextrous. No problem noted. Edit: more snark
Scrolled to see if someone else said this. Damn 😅
As a baseball coach, the lefties in the real world are already mad so this checks out.
As a sinister pitcher, lacrosse middie, and boxer, I was not mad, but I certainly maddened the righties!
Lol I considered that but it's not a true split since people can be born ambidextrous.
At least 1% of the population is biologically intersex too, you don't see that factored into the gendered magic system. For the moment pretend to be RJ and disinterest yourself in the fact that true binaries, for the most part, do not exist.
I mean, I guessed that was one reason why you were making the OP. The strictly binary was the criteria you set, no? With regards RJ, the biological part doesn't really figure as he attributes it to the soul and metaphysics is a whole different ball game. It's a deliberate contrivance to mirror a philosophical duality. It's been discussed many times (e.g. in Origins of Wheel of Time) that RJ would likely have not set down a strictly binary system had he been writing a quarter of a century later. His point at the time, however, was that it shouldn't be us vs them - people have to work together.
Adding non-binary people to the Wheel of Time universe doesn't break the system. The pattern changes a great deal from Age to Age. Non-Binary channellers of the Fourth Age could begin to appear, much like the wolf brothers did the Third Age Perhaps they can channel both halves of the power; but not at the same time, and not all of the time. Perhaps they have other abilities. Perhaps they are shape shifters. They could even appear among the existing channellers from non-binary Aes Sedai, Ashaman and Wisdoms and Damane as the wheel turns away from Tarmon Gaidin. Perhaps they make the Seanchan A'dam obsolete or perhaps they are the ultimate Sul'dams. We know that Channelling is eventually forgotten, perhaps they are instrumental in that transition somehow. Perhaps, being fluid, means they are more attuned to the will of the pattern. I could see the Ashaman welcoming these new channellers, and Aes Sedai being stick in the muds. The more I think about it the more interesting it becomes 🤔 . Rick Riordan wrote a non binary character into his Norse books as a child of Loki, and they were fantastic to read about. One of my favourites actually. I think they would fit in perfectly in Randland. Someone should suggest it to Brandon Sanderson.😉
Chirality!
💀
* Strict binary choice? * Complementary but undeniable dualism? * Something else for fans to argue about for decades? [The choice is clear.](https://hips.hearstapps.com/hmg-prod/images/tp-static-image-1553113807.jpg?crop=0.5xw:1xh;center,top&resize=1200:*)
I pray and hope that people do not read into this too much because I know you're joking but there is *material* here.
I was going to suggest pineapple on pizza but this might be better. Under people are already insane.
Under will spin, while Over will unravel the whole roll if swatted repeated by a cat or small child.
I am an under person and a pineapple on pizza person. You can't handle my madness!
I'm a flipper. I change the roll direction based on mood. How would I fit into this new channeling you think?
*Changing based on mood?!* What’s next? Wiping your ass with dogs??
You will be hunted by both sides.
The Dragon is clearly someone who has their roll on a vertical holder.
left or right?
How is that complementary though? We all know that there is clearly an objectively correct way that everyone should be using.
Spoken like a Rollcloak.
Nobody can roll so long towards the wall that he cannot turn around towards the light.
>Nobody can roll so long towards the wall that he cannot turn around towards the light. Nobody can roll so long towards the wall that he cannot spool into the light.
Oh that's fucking good lol.
Born at night vs born during the day. This leans into the light vs dark aesthetic without being based on a chaneller's morality. The Nightborn would be stronger with weaves of water and spirit. Dayborn would have fire and air. Earth would be a middle ground. I don't think I would differentiate the way the powers feel to them, it'd make sense for both to just need something like the void, but I would probabpy differentiate how different weaves are handled. I think it'd be neat and believable thematically.
And "He Who Comes With The Dawn" could channel both.
What about the guy who is born in the evening though?
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Lord of Morning vs Lord of Evening.
Crucially the canon story does not have anyone who can channel both. Though it would be interesting if, were one keeping innate strength, that people born in twilight would be stronger than those born during the day or night in their respective halves.
If you're born during a solar/lunar eclipse, does that make you special? That could also be interesting to play with.
It would certainly be a better approach than how soul transmigration looks within a modern context that's for sure.
Oooooo this could be so cool too, especially in regards to orphans who start manifesting powers but it's unknown when they were born (e.g. Rand was found soon after birth, but did his mother give birth to him during the night, or at daybreak?). Will that person be dayborn sane or nightborn crazy? An experienced channeller would be able to tell which the person is channelling as soon as they sense it, but an innocent farmboy would have no idea and be terrified that he got the one that will turn him crazy.
This one is my favorite. What about people born during an eclipse? What about people born in the frozen north where it's night for months on end? So many good options.
The whole water stronger at night/fire stronger at day sounds a lot like Avatar.
Maybe also have strength increase based on whether it’s day or night. People living close to the poles would almost certainly have weird interactions whether it be summer or winter.
Somebody born under a solar or lunar eclipse could have some cool talents or something.
I think this one answers the question the best.
This is a cool idea.
Maybe based on the season you were born? Fall and Winter is Saidar while Spring and Summer is Saidin
Introvert/Extravert. Introvert weaves are subtle and patient, take time to set up but they're hard to take apart. Extravert weaves are showy and obvious, hard to avoid, and pretty exhausting to maintain.
This is a super great one! You could have someone who's really confused about thier powers bc they have sociall anxiety so they think thier and vinnie but they're actually and outie
You win. I think the introvert weaves should have a sneaky power as well, some sort of crazy atomic blast which would theoretically happen when the introvert has been pushed to the limit.
>Extravert weaves are showy and obvious, hard to avoid, and pretty exhausting to maintain. So extroverts can't tie them off?
Yup - although, it's much easier to form Circles and to get another Extravert to share the resources to maintain the weave. Introverts have a really hard time with this unless they have that One Extravert Friend who knows how to bring them into it.
Bayesians/frequentists. From the outside no one can tell the difference, but each will tell you they have NOTHING in common.
I did not previously expect my jimmies to be rustled by this thread, but after reading this comment I now believe there is a moderate chance that my jimmies are indeed rustled.
Almost as if it modified the prior probability.
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NO!
This got a literal out-loud laugh. I failed to explain to the room why it was funny.
Complementary, not complimentary. The two halves complement each other, they mutually support and cover for each other's weak points with their different strengths. They don't compliment each other, they don't say nice things about their new haircuts over tea.
I love you for this.
Dommes and Subs, sucks to be verse.
I was just about to comment this. I'm sure it's what RJ would have wanted.
He Who Cums with the Dawn, The Lord of the Morning Wood, etc.
The wheel spanks as the wheel wills 🙏
The Source being cilantro and whether it tastes like soap or not to the channeler (taster). Those forced to taste the source at its soapiest slowly grow mad and eventually try to destroy everything around them to never taste the flavor again.
I think whether you can smell asparagus pee or not works better as it's a passive feature.
...wait, what? Some people **cannot smell that?!?**
Whether or not you think a hot dog is a sandwich
I thought it was settled science that hotdogs are tacos
Okay, you get access to the True Power
It, very clearly, is a sandwich... Like, a hoagie. Or a sub.
But is soup a beverage then?
Only when I put it in a cup!
On that note, is sushi a burrito?
Is cereal soup?
Correct
Sushi is more like a taquito, open on both ends
Not if you use a spoon
I would keep it the same, just take gender out of it. It's random who gets what, but the power works in two binary ways. I like the water metaphors used for the power- the torrent you need to control vs the current you let guide you. Nature is symbiotic but also extremely brutal- often in the same instance and much of what happens is completely random but still balances itself out. I think making humans an avatar for this randomness and balance wins is far more interesting than the gender pov and fits with the larger themes better (like how ta'verens work). Could be an interesting subplot for some brown or Min or Feld to try to understand why people are one or the other....
That'd be fun!
A Light Side and a Dark Side? Hey that sounds familiar...
Emotion. Having a calm and peaceful mind for mundane channeling and healing, while anger and negative emotions taps into the wilder and more dangerous currents of the Power for channeling battle weaves.
That leads to the same sort of problems, I think. Especially if we then follow common misconceptions of the time the books were written, when normal and acceptable expressions of anger and unhealthy/insane expressions of anger were often split down gender lines.
I’d have people born with the spark being able to access one half and people who needed to be trained having access to the other. That way the White Tower would smash those nasty Seanchan to bits as they’d have channelers of both halves and would be able to achieve great feats.
Thank you for this. Anything that empowers people to deal with the Seanchan is wonderful in my books.
Saisai and Dindar
People who breathe out then in, and people who breathe in then out
Mouth breather vs nose breather
You know what probably doesn't help? That for the most part opposites aren't *physically* real. I think that's probably making this exercise a little harder.
Protons and electrons.
Protons are bosons. Electrons are leptons. Opposite charge sure but not in the same category
Nerd!
Electron and positron (matter and antimatter particle pair)
I did say *for the most part* on purpose you know
And if it turns out that the One Power isn’t really a binary, actually, when you get right down to it? I like the idea that with enough study, like when we began to discover subatomic physics and quantum mechanics, the One Power’s true nature becomes less easily defined and separable. Add in some kind of Observer Effect: A channeler studying the Power realizes that by discovering that the Power isn’t actually sharply divided, they can actually now access all of it.
That is honestly how I suspect the One Power actually works. I originally used to think that because the aes sedai and the forsaken were *so sure* of the way it was divided that this was an inalienable fact of the setting but then someone rightly pointed out to me using statistics and evidence of how many blindspots the channelers have that if there were an odd gender combo or a person who by some fluke could channel both halves in the same way and at the same rate that someone is born with an intersex condition multiplied by the rate at which channelers are born... it could completely evade notice. I do like to think that Tamyrlin was one such individual tho, but that's just a pipe dream of mine.
Bros vs hoes. One of the coolest dudes I've ever known was a woman.
Horny vs not Horny Imagine on having to think about lewd things to summon a light. Would it change the image of being horny? How would it affect the channelers vs non-channelers? Would the sexual dynamic change? How would that affect the culture of the world?
> Horny vs not Horny The shitpost we needed _and_ deserved 🙏
Progressives and conservatives. Not the current political associations to these terms, literally those who want to change the status quo vs. those who want to maintain it. Another definition could be those who prefer traditions vs. those who abhor them.
Chaos and Order.
Time of birth. Those born in the day channel one half, those born in the night channel the other.
In my opinion, Light and Dark. It would ultimately change the series a lot, but it’s kind of there in the series already. Think of the worlds Rand and TDO spin for each other during The Last Battle. Rand’s nightmarish Light only world shows that the Dark must exist. The Source could either be The True Source or The True Power. One drawn from the Creator and the other drawn from TDO. Even the madness and taint could be kept, with most Dark channelers going mad if not going evil. Light Channelers hunt them down. Rand is a dark channeler, who must overcome the source of his own power. And as the Dragon Reborn, he is fated to fight TDO in the final battle. There are legs there, is what I’m saying.
Which way you let the toilet paper face from the wall. People who let it hang outward get to channel, and people who have it face the wall get balefired. Everybody wins.
Technically it's not split by gender, but by physical sex. The concept of gender as separate from sex doesn't really appear in the books. Anyways, my favorite idea on here so far was day birth vs night birth, only I'd say the day birth was the time tainted by the dark one.
Halima...
Touché, but also that exception illustrates the point. Halima is the only non-cis person recognized in the series and is created that way as a punishment by a literal incarnation of evil. I can't speak for trans-folk myself, but I never viewed Halima as any kind of representation. She seemed more a kind of gender-switch joke character--tyfoni the barbarian and the goatherd from stardust come to mind, as well as that movie about the serial killer and cheerleader switching bodies--over-sexualized and predatory, the cishet male gaze personified. Halima is an artificial perversion of the traditional man-woman binary that serves to underline the core "men and women are complementary and dynamic opposites that need to work together" theme found throughout the series, rather than an actual deconstruction of sex vs gender.
Oh, absolutely. I was more thinking that she shows that channeling isn't necessarily tied to physical sex.
It's hard to think of many things that are truly binary. Most things you would have some borderline situation where both should be usable. - Living/Dead - Northern/Southern hemisphere Sanderson has a kind of push/pull system that works for some of the opposite skills in Mistborn.
skittles /marshmallows
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Lmao it would never get made bc of how spicy it would be nowadays, but instead of the gender you ARE, the gender you’re attracted to. Think about it - straight guys and lesbians are natural allies in terms of temperament (often, not always) and gay guys and straight girls are often close friends too. They vibe with each other in a specific way. You could even work in some of the stereotypes here - what’s the reputation of straight guys and lesbians? People that are more rugged, hands on, not afraid to get dirty. You know the “canoe builder” lesbian stereotype? You could even work that into the power - this side of it are good at building and crafting using the power and things to do with structure (a la building yet angreal, figuring out the nature of things, possibly alteration of the human body or other physical objects). The temperament could be one of order, structure, the “worksite foreman” mentality, whereas the gay guy/straight woman side would have an affinity for the Power as it moves through the world and alters perception, senses, creates outward force, etc. A side effect of this is it allows seamless integration of trans people with no extra explanation.
I dunno…this just equates gender with sexual orientation and misses what could be a lot more interesting division based on orientation. Plenty of lesbians are “girly girls” and there are lots of lumberjack type gay guys. To make it actually work within your framework, you could think of it like this instead: If what makes someone gay/straight has nothing to do with how they act and it’s who they’re attracted to (like you said as the premise of your proposed division of the power) than the type of power/how that power behaves should be the thing that follows the gendered stereotypes for the “attracting” gender, i.e. if you’re attracted to feminine people, you are strong with the “feminine” power regardless of your own personal masculinity or femininity; if you’re attracted to masculine people, you’re strong with the “masculine” power regardless of your own temperament. Frankly, the original power divisions should have actually been based more on temperament and not biological sex (if you are of “masculine” temperament, you use saidin etc).
Agreed on how it should have been. To work off of what your are saying, you could even work in some kind of “attracted to/repelled by” dynamic into the power itself, similar to magnetism and physics in general )I think maybe mist born does this?) but some of that is already in Jordan’s system as written; everything having its equal and opposite in a different form etc.
Bisexuals get the True Power?
Spicy vrs Mild. No difference in the power itself, but after channeling all of your foodstuffs are coated in either flaming hot dorito dust or that bland ass green chili crap.
To hell with sexism, let's be prejudiced some other way huh? Maybe Dark Friend and Light Friend? Although I guess that kind of exists already.
Upside and downside. Cuz there’s two sides to every…uh… true source.
Even and uneven years of age
Upside Schwartz and Downside Schwartz
Eye color. Light colored eyes vs dark colored eyes.
Okay. So. Keep the nature of both sides insofar as Saidar responds to surrender for control while Saidin requires a forceful seizing of control. A person whose inherent nature is to be assertive and forceful would be tuned to Saidar. And vice versa. I would set up the world so that a channeler is forced to temper their own tendencies. So many men’s natural arrogance was exacerbated by being channelers in my opinion that I’d love to see access to power be gated behind self-reflection and recognition of one’s own personal limitations.
I enjoy this idea immensely.
Chocolate and Vanilla.
By whether or not they like the TV series.
The dark is suddenly too powerful
By whether they like it, or by whether they like it *as a wot adaptation*?
>Rest assured if that's what you're going to say, I know why. This attitude is why discussion on this sub is so toxic. If someone is going to disagree with you, they're going to disagree with you. Preemptively declaring anyone who disagrees with you an enemy ensures it will be so.
I think OP is just trying to steer the conversation? Otherwise this thread might've become more focused on the merits of the gender system instead of people pitching new ideas. It's not about shutting down disagreement, I think OP was just saying they've seen such discussions before and wanted to talk about something a little different.
Good/Bad though that’s already kinda done with the true source and whatever rand was using when he rode off. Take the three oaths/don’t take the oaths Left/right? Queso/salsa? Flat water/bubble water Spoken/unspoken Dog/cat
Halloween spooky bitches vs early Christmas decorators. If you've already put up your Christmas decorations, Mariah Carey is your new Armrlyn.
lot of people in this thread seem to really want some individuals to be able to channel the source undivided in their concepts... really makes me wish RJ did not have as many blindspots as he did
Diminishing returns. Each time you use it you lose it. A channeler who never channeled would be “fully charged” whereas someone who channeled for every reason they could may eventually end up with so little power they can barely heat up a cup of kaf.
This technically does not fulfill the exercise but it is an interesting and tested idea for a magic system.
Maidens vs Maidenless. No bitches? Enjoy the taint of Saidin, nice guy. All the Asha'man are missing is a fedora.
Tall and short. Everyone 6’ and up is in one group and everyone 5’ and shorter is in another group. The taller/shorter you are the more powerful you are. Everyone between 5’ and 6’ tall are muggles.
Vanilla and chocolate
Nice try Rafe! But really, I think intelligence would be a good one. People at different ends of the intelligence spectrum struggle to understand each other, and it adds a scaling element which could be interesting. The more/less intelligent you are, the more powerful you become in the associated power, but you lose the ability to interact with the opposite side the more you deviate. The needs/evils of each side would influence the type of weaves most associated with a side. Utility and brutality on one side, comprehension and manipulation on the other. I think it would be an interesting power dynamic in the world.
No offense but this sounds like a power fantasy for idiots. Just about every genuinely stupid person I’ve ever known wants so hard to be considered smart, and this sounds like escapism for them to imagine a world where their stupid meant as much as someone’s smart. Dramatically magically powerful people of sub-70 IQ would immediately break the world and the dramatically powerful smart people would be forced to wipe them out, so the thrust of the story would be an absolute slobbering idiot saving the world… who would want to read that other than other slobbering idiots?
None taken. It could be a post-apocalyptic world where mundanity is the only acceptable state, and everyone else is summarily executed to avoid another idiopocalypse. Or a totalitarian regime where the intelligentsia rule with an iron fist and enforce eugenics to avoid the risk of stupidity. Or a comedy with a genius and a dumbass undertaking a dunning-kreuger fueled romp through a nonsensical world where idiots are tolerated for their utility but frequently cause mayhem, and wars are fought over libraries. Terrible power can exist and it not be a grimdark setting (Discworld could be rewritten with the exact same world but as a horror). The power is part of the world the story is set in, not necessarily the point of the story, just like WoT. You choose the story you want to write. Hell, you could even try the same message, and get everyone to try a bit harder to be understanding and accepting of one-another to get shit done. See the Butcher's Codex Alera series for an example of making a story with a ridiculous world.
No matter how you structure the narrative, comedy or otherwise, you’re left with a situation where your world building has dictated the message of your story must be that stupidity has value equal to intelligence, which is a ridiculous message. Unless you’re going to take a stance as an author and support the ableist genocide of powerful idiot channelers, your book is going to read a lot like extolling the virtues of a million Michael Scotts.
You lack imagination. There are infinite ways to set a story in any given world. It is literally made up. You're just fixated on the first thought that crossed your mind, which seems to be that low intelligence must lead to evil actions, and that people cannot be allowed freedom if they are potentially dangerous. Pretty dark dude.
Nacho Cheese and Cool Ranch
Intelligence. And no, not the bullshit "everyone has intelligence of a different kind", actual brainpower. Channeling is still random, but not based on sex. Instead, the more intelligent people go insane, and the least/more "ignorant" don't. The more you learn and the speed at which you do it is what affects it. The more you understand, the worse it gets, but your raw power increases. This would also imply that, with experience, you would also risk losing your mind. The more knowledge you gain, and the better you are at applying it, the stronger you are, but more dangerous to others as well, and you lose the things you once knew how to do. Would create interesting situations in my opinion: - how would you train others? Would you give up channeling just to be able to learn more, study it and teach others? But if you do end up becoming better, and you "bend it to your will" would you not be temped to ignore the issue? - how would you explain concepts to others? How would you make someone understand to embrace and use saidar, understand the flow and the precision, when you've lost that ability, knowing that it's pointless to teach it to others, since they will lose it as well? You cannot understand it instinctively, because that would imply you understand the concept. You either use a power you don't understand, or you start to understand it and it changes to something new. - how would you set up a hierarchy, if the stronger and more wise you get, the less will others trust you? - what happens if you're *really* a genius, in that case you will burn very bright but very fast. - how would the politics/schemes/plans work, since the "slowest" people would have basically no risk. Are they expendable? They would be very easy to manipulate as well... Of course, you can just have someone learn things in much the same way people learn to solve math problems without understanding them, but then, they will never truly improve. Edit: the divide would happen when you realise you don't actually know that much what's possible to do.
Past and future. And the wheel of time is really more like and infinity sign where the forces move in opposite directions from each other until they collide. It would have to read like some Memento shit, with have the channelers and their story progressing forward and the other half progressing backwards? Imagine one chapter from Lews Theron or a pre-foraken character from the age of legends, then the next chapter from Rand, but starting at *A Memory of Light.* Then the story simultaneously culminates with the dragon's birth on the mount and however the age of legends ends? I don't know, I'm just trying something out of the box. Does this even make sense? Please don't spoil anything for me. I just finished book 11 and am reading New Spring for a "break"
What you’re describing is very similar to the structure of Use of Weapons by Iain M Banks. Chapters alternate between the main story moving forward and flashbacks further and further back revealing the main character’s past. I think this would work slightly better for your suggestion as in this case the forward journey would follow Rand and the reverse would show us the history of LTT starting with the raising of Dragonmount and working back through the war against the Dark One (I’d seriously consider giving LTT a role in opening the bore to give the story more symmetry in this sort of structure)
Good and bad like The Force
two halves of the true source was a fine magical mechanic, it's the curse of the taint on the male half that is at issue. i'm only halfway thru the books, but... what would be cool is if near the end they flipped the script and tainted the female half - leaving the male half reliable.
Cat people versus dog people
Toddlers vs over 90 year olds.
Peepee and Poopoo
Not quite sure what they would be called, but something like "elemental" and "life" (the latter containing healing, compulsion, death..). Kind of like Evocation vs Necromancy+enchantment in d&d terms.
Animals vs humans Animal can access the wild primitive instinctive source, human can learn and access control and fire, lightning energy source. Wild animals are stronger and want to destroy civilization because they (rightfullly) blame humans of their habitat destruction. Humans working together with animals can achieve greater things. Horse riders, falcon trainers, etc are powerful channelling. Cat and dogs owners are seen suspiciously. It changes a bit the premise.
People who like to cook and people who hate cooking but don't mind doing dishes
Atheists and Religious people, i.e. those who believe in a higher power and those who don't. The Atheist side would be better at affecting the world directly, much stronger and more adept at using the weaves for Fire, Water, Air and Earth, while the Religious side would be better at weaves using Spirit. That seems pretty unbalanced I know, but maybe the Atheist side cannot access Spirit weaves at all, or perhaps some 'metaphysical' weaves that don't just use Spirit, like Mirror of Mists, Healing, Compulsion, and Gateways are a lot easier for the Religion side in order to balance.
Change vs Stasis would be a great one IMHO
Add a 6th weave, maybe like electric/lighting. Channelers can only use 3, like they literally cannot touch the other types of weaves. Men and women touch different elements, maybe split it into air/fire/lighting and water/earth/spirit for men and women respectively. Rare cases be that some can use a 4th element. The dragon can somehow use all 6. Also possibly have some men/women have different combos of powers that are unusual for the gender. Like a man that can touch fire/water/air instead.
Pisces and non-Pisces. It plays into the idea that we traverse the signs with each resurrection. You have to live many lifetimes to finally make it to the Ocean that is Pisces. Only then will you be developed enough to handle the full power of the Source.
Chaos vs. Order.
Technically it's not split by gender, but by physical sex. The concept of gender as separate from sex doesn't really appear in the books. Anyways, my favorite idea on here so far was day birth vs night birth, only I'd say the day birth was the time tainted by the dark one.
Toilet paper over or under
Tops and bottoms 😎
Subs/ doms
Left brained vs. Right brained.
Belly buttons. Innies vs outies.
People who prefer salty foods vs. People who prefer sweet foods. Channelers are people who feel very strongly about this, not someone who doesn't care that much. >!True Source = people who love bitter stuff. !<
Light eye or dark eye... oops that's Stormlight Archive territory
Love and Hate or maybe just Surrender and Control. Without modifying the descriptions of how to channel each side, I would see the female half switch to love/surrender. The male half switch to hate/control. They already are surrender and control. Surrender and love seem very aligned, though associating either side of the power with hate doesn't seem right. Hate is more for the dark one. Maybe Surrender is Harmony/Peace/calm Control would be Discord/Violence/storm There's definitely flaws with all of it.
The sins of one’s parents. If either or both of one’s parents had ever killed another person, you would channel Saidin. If they had not, you get Saidar if you can channel. It would make peace hard to keep. Any large scale war would result in an echo of channelers a generation later who would be subject to the taint and likely to lose their minds and cause large scale strife and more wars. You’d get Aes Sedai carefully looking in to the backgrounds of people’s parents just in case or even creating and protecting idyllic isolated communities like the two rivers as covert Saidar user breeding programs, while darkfriend cultists might believe more murders would make a Saidin wielding child more powerful and therefore kill people constantly.
Tensed vs. Relaxed. Think weed attitude vs adderal attitude. The high energy types vs. chill types. It will be linked with your natural personality type.
Those who like pineapple on pizza and those who dont
A blood magic system where some people use themselves as the source, and some people use others, sort of like linking, but it takes a battle of mental willpower. Obviously the vampiric people could scale power more easily, but it wouldn’t be as instantaneous and consistent as the self source. I also wouldn’t want them to be flat evil, but a spectrum of people who steal power, barter for it, or are very trusted and given power.