The One Power Explanation Page (Wheel of Time)

==Introduction to the One Power==
The One Power is the main system of magic in the Wheel of Time universe. It comes from the True Source, the "driving force of creation, the force the Creator made to turn the Wheel of Time...The True Source cannot be used up..." 
The True Source is divided into a male half and a female half. The male half of the Power is called saidin, and the female half is called saidar. The One Power has five different types of threads, Fire, Earth, Water, Air, and Spirit. These are known as the Five Powers, the subcategories of the One Power. The act of using magic is known as channeling. The power of a channeler is limited only by the amount of One Power they are able to draw.
Spells are called weaves in the Wheel of Time, and are accomplished by drawing on threads of the One Power and directing the flows. Different weaves use different combinations of the five types of threads. Simple spells like blasts of fire can be done simply by weaving Fire, while complex spells like controlling the weather use a multitude of intertwining flows of Air, Water, and Spirit. A weave's power can vary dramatically depending on the size of the flow used to make it. For example, an extremely powerful channeler can make enormous fireballs capable of melting hilltops, while fireballs made with less Power would only destroy walls. This property applies to all weaves, with powerful channelers able to make much more potent effects than less powerful ones. Weaves can be "tied off" once made so that they don't need to be continually maintained by the channeler.
Channelers can see the weaves of other channelers of the same gender, with the other gender's weaves being invisible to them. However, males can detect females channeling via a skin tingle, and females have a weave that allows them to detect males channeling.
Men are generally stronger in the Power than women and have more talent with Fire and Earth, while women are generally more dexterous at weaving and have more talent with Water and Air. There are exceptions of course. Both have equal overall talent for Spirit. Truly exceptional individuals such as the Forsaken and Rand al'Thor have extreme talent in all the Five Powers, while most channelers are lucky to have great talent in even two or three.
==Organization of Channelers==
By and large, female channelers belong to the White Tower and are termed Aes Sedai. Rand al'Thor establishes the Black Tower and recruits male channelers for training, naming them Asha'man. Other cultures have their own organizations of channelers, such as the Sea Folk Windfinders, the Aiel Wise Ones, the Seanchan damane, and the Sharan Ayyad.
Channelers that serve the Shadow are termed Dreadlords, and they function as lieutenants under the Forsaken in the Last Battle.
==Objects of Power==
Angreal: These are objects that allow their user to draw much more of the Power than they can normally hold unaided. There are male and female angreal, and they cannot be used by the other gender. The level of boost depends both on the strength of the angreal as well as the strength of the channeler. A stronger channeler using the same angreal as a weaker channeler would obtain a much larger boost from it. 
Even extremely weak channelers, however, obtain massive boosts in power, becoming many times as powerful. Post-captivity Moiraine is stated by the WoT Companion to be equal in Power to Sorilea, who has repeatedly been noted in the books to barely be capable of channeling a trickle compared to the rivers that the likes of Egwene and Elayne could draw (pre-captivity Moiraine was not far below those two). Yet Moiraine, when aided by a strong angreal, was amped to significantly beyond her pre-captivity self. 
Another example is that Cadsuane, weaker than Egwene and Elayne when unaided, was stated by the WoT Companion to become as strong as Rand's maximum power when using her angreal. And Rand himself was able to effortlessly overpower both Egwene and Elayne at once using just a tiny fraction of his power.
As discussed just above, a strong angreal provides an exponential boost to even extremely weak channelers, and the most powerful channelers experience a much more massive boost in comparison.
Sa'angreal: These are far more powerful versions of angreal, and are much rarer. They are stated to amp their user as much above an angreal as an angreal does above their base state. The only known female sa'angreal are Vora's white rod, used by Egwene, and the female Choedan Kal. The known male sa'angreal are Callandor, the third most powerful male sa'angreal ever made, Sakarnen, the second most powerful, and the male Choedan Kal, by far the most powerful. 
Ter'angreal: These are objects of Power that perform specific functions. Some require their user to be able to channel in order activate them while others can be used by anyone. There are far too many ter'angreal to succinctly list, with an extremely wide variety of functions.
==Severing==
Severing is the process whereby a channeler loses the ability to channel. Severing in men is termed gentling, while in women it is called stilling. Severing can be done purposely to someone, either with a precision attack or by simply overwhelming them with drastically more powerful weaves than they can deal with, as when Rand al'Thor accidentally severed some Aes Sedai when breaking through their shield weave.
Channelers can also burn out, which occurs when they draw much more One Power into themselves than they are able to safely handle.
==Linking==
Linking is the process by which channelers can meld their flows to increase strength and precision, with a single channeler being in control of the entire group's Power. Women are needed to initiate a link, although men can join circles as well. Thirteen female channelers can link without a man, but beyond that number men are needed to keep expanding the circle. The maximum size of a circle is 72 channelers, and the strongest circles have a near-even balance of female and male channelers.
==Passive Effects of Power Use==
Elongated Lifespan: Channeling the Power drastically slows the aging process, with 300 year old Aes Sedai in the Age of Legends being considered "middle aged." In modern times the Aes Sedai of the White Tower unintentionally shorten their lifespan with the Oath Rod, but they still normally live for hundreds of years.
Greatly Enhanced Senses and Reactions: Actively embracing the True Source is shown many times throughout the series to drastically enhance the user's senses and reaction time. All five of their senses are expanded, allowing them to make out the stitching on far-away people's clothing for example, or to hear heartbeats to intuit whether someone is lying. In terms of reaction speed, channelers experience a "slow-down" effect automatically when weaving and responding to other combatants. Calling lightning from the sky is one of the most common combat weaves used by channelers fighting each other, and below are two of the most clearly-explained examples I can remember:
*"Lightning leaped from the cloud, straight for Nynaeve's heart. It seemed to her, just for a heartbeat, as if time had suddenly slowed, as though that heartbeat took forever. She felt the flow inside - saidar, came a distant thought - felt the answering flow in the lightning. And she altered the direction of the flow. Time leaped forward."
*"The Forsaken did not slow, and as he vanished, lightning flashed from the glowing clouds toward Rand, stabbing blindly but meant to kill. Running, Rand wove a shield around himself. Shards of stone bounded from it as he dodged crackling blue bolts, leapt over the holes they tore in the pavement. The air itself sparkled; the hair of his arms lifted with it, the hair on his head stirred."
*"Lightning stabbed from the cloudless sky. Rand wove Fire and Air to meet Fire and Air, a slow-spreading shield racing lightnings' fall. Too slow. One bolt struck the shield directly above his head, shattering in a blinding glare, but others grounded themselves, and his hair lifted as the air itself seemed to hammer him down." While I won't post the entire scene here, note that the "too slow" refers to Rand not being in time to protect everyone around him as well. He was more than fast enough to shield himself upon reacting to a surprise attack where the lightning was already falling when he noticed it.
==Commonly Used Weaves==
It is important to note that all major channelers have displayed the same, or similar, weaves throughout the series. This is mainly due to the fact that Aes Sedai are trained in the White Tower, the damane learn weaves from other damane and from newly captured Aes Sedai, the Asha'man were all trained to be weapons from the moment they joined the Black Tower, etc. Though their training is not seen, even the Sharan Ayyad perform basically the same weaves as any other group of channelers. Weaves unique to certain characters, such as the Flame of Tar Valon, which is solely used by Egwene, are listed on their respective pages rather than here.
==Combat Weaves==
Balefire: A weave that fires a stream of white energy, described as liquid fire, that completely erases from existence whatever it touches. It retroactively erases its target from the timeline in an amount proportional to the amount of Power used to form the weave. If enough Power is used, local reality begins to destabilize, which is why the weave is forbidden and only used as a last resort, or out of ignorance, by many good characters. Others, like the Forsaken, Dreadlords, and Rand for much of the series, are much more quick to resort to it.
Calling Lightning: A weave that requires Fire, Earth, Water, and Air to be interwoven, the user summons lightning bolts from the sky down onto their target. Channelers on the powerful side such as Aviendha can summon storm clouds from five miles away, and Forsaken-tier channelers such as Rand have casually summoned hundreds at once, all with precise targets.
Cutting Weaves: A weave only used by channelers when they are confronting other Power users, these weaves interrupt enemy attacks by slicing through the flows making them up, preventing the attack from being completed. Despite not being able to see each other's weaves, sufficiently skilled men and women have both demonstrated the ability to intuit the likely path of the other's weaves, letting them slice through them.
Defensive Barriers: A standard defense for channelers is to create various types of barriers against their enemy's attacks. Some accomplish this by weaving Air into a solid barrier, or sometimes a thick, viscous barrier that slows attacks rather than stops them completely. Others use different weaves to create energy barriers, such as when Rand weaved Fire, Earth, and Air to generate a powerful protective barrier.
Fire Ball: Possibly the most common combat weave, fire balls simply use Fire to throw a blast of flame that detonates on impact. Aes Sedai have trained themselves to require a throwing motion to properly use the weave, but others such as the Wise Ones don't need to make any movement to use it.
Hardened Air: This weave uses flows of Air to create solid, invisible constructs of varying size and complexity. A common use is to simply bind one's opponent in a solid mass of air, preventing them from moving at all. It can also be used to create myriad invisible blades, blunt instruments, tentacles, barriers, etc.
Riven Earth: A weave using Fire and Earth that causes the ground to violently explode under the user's target, blasting and burning at the same time.
Shields: These are not defensive barriers, but rather weaves that prevent the target from touching the Source to draw Power. 
==Supplemental Weaves==
Delving: A "diagnostic" weave that allows the user to determine what is wrong in someone's body, usually used prior to Healing.
Disguise: A standard weave of Spirit used to hide one's ability to channel from being sensed by others. Specific weaves can be disguised as well, in an instantaneous process called inverting. A long-lasting version of this weave is called Masking the Power.
Eavesdropping: A weave of Spirit and Air that allows the user to pick up on targeted conversations.
Finder: A weave of Spirit that is placed on an object or person and allows the user to sense their direction and distance wherever they go.
Fog Creation: Using Water and Air, the user can cover a large area in fog provided there is a body of water nearby to draw from.
Folded Light: A weave of Fire and Air that bends light around the target/user, making them invisible. It is a stationary weave, although it is claimed that at least Rand al'Thor has worked out how to use it while moving.
Heating: A simple weave of Fire that allows the user to raise the temperature of their target or the local area.
Keeping: A weave used to prevent decay/rot/spoilage, usually used to preserve food.
Liquid Control: A class of weaves that allow the user to manipulate liquid to their will, such as when Moiraine raised part of a pond over Lan's head and dropped it on him. A common use is to dry one's clothes.
Mirror of Mists: Also known as the Mask of Mirrors, or just Illusion, this weave has several variations that can alter the user's appearance and voice in various ways, such as when Moiraine made herself appear tall enough to step over a city wall in order to confuse and intimidate the local soldiers while her party escaped Baerlon.
Sound Amplification: A simple weave of Air that amplifies the user's voice. If Fire is added to the weave it grants the user's voice an intimidating quality.
Wards: A large class of weaves with many variations, such as preventing vermin from entering an area, to making alarm traps, to actively destroying any enemies that set foot past them.
==Travelling==
This weave opens a Gateway, a portal connecting two locations in space. It allows the user to instantly traverse long distances. The caveat is that they must know their starting location very well to be able to Travel a long way away from it. However, they do not need to know their current location well at all if they are just Travelling a short distance away. This advantage is demonstrated several times throughout the series, with combatants like Rand al'Thor and Sammael rapidly teleporting around and behind their enemies while dueling. Furthermore, Travelling to a place automatically allows the user to learn that place well enough to Travel from it, a shortcut often used by Rand. The stronger the user, the larger a Gateway they can open, allowing channelers such as Rand to quickly transport large armies. Gateways can and have been used offensively, as they cut through space itself, meaning whatever is caught in one opening or closing is sliced apart without regard for durability.
*Skimming: A version of Travelling that does not require the user to know their starting location very well before traversing long distances. Skimming opens a portal into a pitch dark void, with a platform modeled after the user's wishes on the other side. The platform moves, floating along in the blackness, until it reaches its destination. At that point a new portal opens and the channeler steps back into the world, having traversed a much longer distance than the travel time would indicate.
*Spying Portal: A variant of Gateway discovered by Yukiri Sedai in the Last Battle and quickly taught to other channelers, this weave opens a horizontal Gateway above an area, allowing one to look down on the target.
==Healing==
As the name suggests, Healing is a broad subcategory of weaves which cure physical and mental problems in the target's body. However, most Healing knowledge has been lost after the Age of Legends, with only an all-encompassing form of Healing being commonly known at the start of the series. This method heals everything in the body at once, using the patient's own stamina to accomplish the rapid healing. This method can heal large, fatal wounds but cannot regenerate lost body parts, and in cases where the patient has very little stamina remaining they would die from the Healing because their body wouldn't be able to sustain itself afterward. As much more advanced forms of Healing that use all Five Powers are discovered by Nynaeve and Sumeko for the female channelers and Damer Flinn for the male channelers, they are spread among the general channeling populace.
Those with a Talent for Healing are much more naturally skilled at Healing weaves and require less of their own energy to accomplish complex healings.
No channeler can perform healing on themselves.
*Healing from Severing: Nynaeve and Damer Flinn both discovered ways to Heal those who were forcefully severed from the One Power, and spread their discoveries among the Aes Sedai and Asha'man respectively. However, unless the Healing is performed by the opposite gender, the patient will not return the same level of Power they were previously at.
*Pain Removal: Healers can dull or remove pain in their target.
*Refresh: A weave that prevents the target from feeling their exhaustion, although it does not actually make their body any healthier.
Category:The Wheel of Time
Category:Explanation Pages