Sleepless on Scadrial

[Groovydude2]

Re-reading Well of Ascension and Noorden was just introduced, an Obligator seems like an ideal candidate for a Dysian Aimian. Not only do they have the telltale tattoos, but Noorden specifically is mentioned to be unlike most of the other Obligators, focuses on his research (gathering information on this planet for the horde at large?), he works alone, and is in a position of power in the Lord Ruler's government.

Any thoughts? 

[Treamayne]

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8 minutes ago, Groovydude2 said:

Re-reading Well of Ascension and Noorden was just introduced, an Obligator seems like an ideal candidate for a Dysian Aimian. Not only do they have the telltale tattoos, but Noorden specifically is mentioned to be unlike most of the other Obligators, focuses on his research (gathering information on this planet for the horde at large?), he works alone, and is in a position of power in the Lord Ruler's government.

Any thoughts? 

The problem with that idea is that Era 1 of Scadrial is hundreds of years before Stormlight Archive. As of Dawnshard, even Arclo and Nikli have significant troubles impersaniting humans, and most non-Rosharan swarms don't even try. Also, Obligator Tattoos are very specific and only around the eyes and forehead - where Aimians use tattoos (or the appearance thereof) to cover the seams created by the edges of each hordling over their entire body (or at least the esposed parts). 

Spoiler

SamsonOption48

They are not native to Roshar and yet they fit among the Rosharan cremlings so perfectly... So was Rosharan fauna based off of another planet? Or are the crab species on Roshar invasive and from wherever the Sleepless are from? Or are only Rosharan sSleepless made up of crabs because they melded with the local species? Or do living things in the Cosmere evolve into crabs alarmingly often just like in our universe and its a coincidence?

Brandon Sanderson

The ones on other planets will look less like cremlings. Realize that a swarm is always evolving. The first swarm's hordelings were more spider-like when it first came to Roshar.

therealdavegreen

The theme of generations is also a thing we see with the Kandra, who can also disguise themselves. Were the Kandra perhaps modeled after the Sleepless? Or is there any relation at all between the two?

Brandon Sanderson

No direct relationship here.

Phantine

Was Aimia originally terraformed to be more like their home ecosystem (just like how Shinovar is like the human home ecosystem)?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO!

Dawnshard Annotations Reddit Q&A (Nov. 6, 2020)

Good thought though. 

Edited February 8 by Treamayne
SPAG

[alder24]

5 minutes ago, Groovydude2 said:

Re-reading Well of Ascension and Noorden was just introduced, an Obligator seems like an ideal candidate for a Dysian Aimian. Not only do they have the telltale tattoos, but Noorden specifically is mentioned to be unlike most of the other Obligators, focuses on his research (gathering information on this planet for the horde at large?), he works alone, and is in a position of power in the Lord Ruler's government.

Any thoughts? 

I found this unlikely. His tattoos were small enough to be fully covered by glasses. He's behaving too much like a normal human to be a Sleepless in my opinion. But it's an interesting observation, I wonder if there were Sleepless on Scadrial during the Final Empire. 

[Groovydude2]

28 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

Welcome to the Shard. Here are some tips and tricks that you may not yet be aware of (as each forum is slightly different):

  Hide contents

• At the bottom left of a post you will see a "+" icon, a "Quote" link.
• At the bottom right you will see an heart icon (and possibly different reactions in the future).
• At the top right you will see a hamburger menu (three dots) which shows: Report, Share, and (your posts only) Edit and Hide tools.

Likes/Reactions:

  Reveal hidden contents

• The Heart Icon (Like) is how you thank people or "like" a post
  • Likes, Mentions and Quotes should all send an alert to the appropriate person - even when added to an old post through the Edit feature.

Report Tool:

  Reveal hidden contents

• Use  the Report tool to report any post (your own or others) to a forum Mod
  • Use this if you do accidentally double-post (sometimes it's the browser or a slow link that causes a double post) - just leave a message that it was an accidental double post and the Mods can fix it. If it was the first post of a new thread that doubled, they usually can merge the threads if they both have answers, so all of the content is retained.
  • For reporting Spam, only report a single post by the user to let the Mods and Admins know - they get messages for each "report" so reporting each Spam post is annoying and unnecessary. If all posts by a "new user" (bot) are all spam - then all of those posts will be deleted when that account is deleted.

Hide Tool:

  Reveal hidden contents

• Use the Hide tool to hide your post if you want to remove it after posting (useful for accidental double-posts)
  • Hiding the first post in a Thread will hide the threan as long as ther have been no replies (Needs Testing)

Mentions:

  Reveal hidden contents

• You can "Mention" a person by typing "@" and slowly typing their user name (spelling matters). As you spell their name, the interface will show a pop-up with matches - when you match appears, click it to add the Mention
  • Likes, Mentions and Quotes should all send an alert to the appropriate person - even when added to an old post through the Edit feature.

Quote Methods:

  Reveal hidden contents

• The "Quote" link is exactly that, when you click it the quote will be added to the reply at the bottom of the thread wherever the cursor is (adding a carraige return if necessary)
  • So, if you have already started to reply before you decide to quote you can then add the quote before or after your text depending on the cursor location when you click "Quote"
• The + icon is multi-quote. As you read a thread, if you want to quote multiple items you can click that for each post you want to quote
  • As you click +, you should see a toaster pop-up on the bottom right of the browser window showing how many quotes you will have
  • They are added in the order you click the + icon, not in the original post order, so you can set the order of quotes for your reply
  • When you are ready to reply, click on the toaster pop-up and it will take you directly to the reply section and add the quotes automatically with one blank line between each for you to add your comment(s)
• Finally, you can also highlight a small section of a post and, when hovering over the highlit portion, click the "Quote Selection" button that pops up.
  • This will also be added to the cursor location, rather than the bottom of the reply.
• Also note that you can move quotes after they have been added to your reply.
  • For example, you add a quote and realize there are no empty lines below it for you to type - so you can hit "enter" before the quote to make an empty line then when you hover over a quote you will see a 4-way arrow at the top-left that you can use to drag the quote up (or down)  and move the quote to before the empty line. . .
  • This is also how you can add quotes to an Edit of your own post. You quote using any of the methods above and the quote will go to the reply section. You then hover over the four-way arrow and use CTRL+C to cut the quote, which you can then paste into your edit window.
• Likes, Mentions and Quotes should all send an alert to the appropriate person - even when added to an old post through the Edit feature.

Editing posts:

  Reveal hidden contents

• Use the Edit link to make changes to a completed post or add information to your post if it is the most recent (to avoid double posting)
  • Quote buttons will still send a quote to "Reply" if you have a post open for edit, but it is easy to cut/paste the quote to the Edit box
  • Editing the first post in a thread allows the thread-creator to edit the thread title (important for changing accidental spoilers)
  • Editing allows you to add a reason for the edit (Spelling and grammar (SPAG), formatting, clarification, new information, etc.), but it is not required.
• Likes, Mentions and Quotes should all send an alert to the appropriate person - even when added to an old post through the Edit feature.

Other:

  Reveal hidden contents

• Quotes and Spoilers are very similar, but here are the differences:
  • Spoiler tags are default "closed" and are not attributed - they may be opened by clicking the spoiler box title
  • Quotes are default "open" (but may be closed by clicking the Quote Title and are denoted by the basic arrow icon on the left side of the quote title), If the quote was added with one of the methods explained above, it will be attributed - if it was added with the quote icon in the Reply/Edit tools, it will not be attributed.
  • Attributed Quotes will have a curved arrow icon on the right side of the quote title to jump directly to the post from which the quote was taken.

Hope that helps.

The problem with that idea is that Era 1 of Scadrial is hundreds of years before Stormlight Archive. As of Dawnshard, even Arclo and Nikli have significant troubles impersaniting humans, and most non-Rosharan swarms don't even try. Also, Obligator Tattoos are very specific and only around the eyes and forehead - where Aimians use tattoos (or the appearance thereof) to cover the seams created by the edges of each hordling over their entire body (or at least the esposed parts). 

  Hide contents

SamsonOption48

They are not native to Roshar and yet they fit among the Rosharan cremlings so perfectly... So was Rosharan fauna based off of another planet? Or are the crab species on Roshar invasive and from wherever the Sleepless are from? Or are only Rosharan sSleepless made up of crabs because they melded with the local species? Or do living things in the Cosmere evolve into crabs alarmingly often just like in our universe and its a coincidence?

Brandon Sanderson

The ones on other planets will look less like cremlings. Realize that a swarm is always evolving. The first swarm's hordelings were more spider-like when it first came to Roshar.

therealdavegreen

The theme of generations is also a thing we see with the Kandra, who can also disguise themselves. Were the Kandra perhaps modeled after the Sleepless? Or is there any relation at all between the two?

Brandon Sanderson

No direct relationship here.

Phantine

Was Aimia originally terraformed to be more like their home ecosystem (just like how Shinovar is like the human home ecosystem)?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO!

Dawnshard Annotations Reddit Q&A (Nov. 6, 2020)

Good thought though. 

Thanks for the welcome! Lurked for a while, made an account to post.

This all makes sense, but I still have my suspicions. Hundreds of years isn't much compared to the tens of thousands of years (most likely longer) they've already been on Roshar, and it seems likely a horde on Scadrial is not directly coming from Roshar but from their original home planet.

Additionally, the highlighted quote implies that on Scadrial their evolution would need to be different and might end up having fewer noticeable "breaks" in the skin since they wouldn't be as crablike in appearance to begin with.

 

 

Edited February 8 by Groovydude2

[Treamayne]

20 minutes ago, Groovydude2 said:

Thanks for the welcome! Lurked for a while, made an account to post.

This all makes sense, but I still have my suspicions. Hundreds of years isn't much compared to the tens of thousands of years (most likely longer) they've already been on Roshar.

Additionally, the highlighted quote implies that on Scadrial their evolution would need to be different and might end up having fewer noticeable "breaks" in the skin since they wouldn't be as crablike in appearance to begin with.

My point was the other direction. After several millennia, they are just now barely able to try imitating humans - and those are only the Rosharan Swarms. The Swarms that never migrated to Roshar are spiderlike and do not even try to imitate humans (found the second WoB Finally):

Spoiler

 

Quote

 

tvchurch2701

Wait - there are Sleepless on other worlds?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes indeed.

Have you seen them? RAFO. (Note that non-Rosharan ones can't imitate humans.)

m4ge

Would the non-Roshar ones have hordelings that look similar to the Rosharan ones, or would they have bred completely differently?

Also, can the Sleepless communicate with the ones on other planets? Do they do so often?

Brandon Sanderson

They would look completely different.

RAFO on the second question.

Dawnshard Annotations Reddit Q&A (Nov. 6, 2020)

 

Quote

Questioner 1

So the Sleepless kind of have me wondering about what sentience is in the cosmere. Like how would a Sleepless manifest on the Cognitive Realm--

Brandon Sanderson

That's a good question, you'll-- that I'll RAFO. But they are a single consciousness, but they would argue that all your cells are independent of you. So they are cells that can move around. They're really fun... they started in a non-cosmere book when I was 22. Obviously a bit inspired by Fire Upon the Deep, one of my favorite science fiction books. And I read that book and I'm like, "Group consciousnesses are cool!" what if you had a species that was made up of-- Not like one of these Ender's Game y'know, one, but each swarm was an individual and they could breed and evolve their own things to do different stuff. So each of these little bits, these hordelings is what I call them-- I might change because we've got cremling now. But each of these little bits is bred for a specific purpose, "Feed the swarm" and stuff like that. So they've got all kinds of cool stuff going on.

Arcanum Unbounded Chicago signing (Dec. 6, 2016)

 

[Groovydude2]

1 minute ago, Treamayne said:

My point was the other direction. After several millennia, they are just now barely able to try imitating humans - and those are only the Rosharan Swarms. The Swarms that never migrated to Roshar are spiderlike and do not even try to imitate humans (found the second WoB Finally):

  Hide contents

 

 

AH! That does completely destroy this theory. RIP. The WOB giveth and the WOB taketh away...

I'll have to keep that in mind for my current and future re-reads!

[Treamayne]

1 minute ago, Groovydude2 said:

I'll have to keep that in mind for my current and future re-reads!

Yeah, outside of Roshar we are (generally) looking for insect and arachnoid like "cameos."