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Post by Jazzman Crothers on Apr 4, 2020 1:07:39 GMT -5
Right!
So we all know about all the ways TFs come to life. And we've heard all the fan theories too, some good and other perverted.
But sparks, a TFs life force aka their soul, is a constant. Not in the original G1 series, at first anyways. Now I'm not saying its a bad idea for what it is. I'm all for it and to me its a magical way for a robot to actually be alive with independent thoughts and feelings. And I say magical because the sparks came from Primus, you know, TF God.
But what if a TF was alive without the spark? What if instead of TFs having souls they were really just had what was in their heads?
If you have watched the Netflix show 'Altered Carbon' you'll know that the definition of human life has been rewritten. Humans can live forever as long as they change their bodies when their current one is about to die due to injury or disease or even old age. Actually the body its self can die but that doesn't mean the person is dead. The person's mind lives on in a device called a stack. The stack is stored in the back of a person's neck (yuck) and has the person's mind saved in it. So the stack can then be placed in a new body.
We know TFs upgrade their bodies or get new ones when their about to die or whatever. I'm assuming here that the TFs brain and spark is transferred into the new body one way or another. Well what if instead of the brain and/or the spark it was something like a stack?
So I'm thinking, what if the crystal like memory engrams introduced in the Marvel comics were used instead? They store a TFs personality, memories and etc and that info can be placed into a new body. It kind of put the 'robot' back into TF since they wouldn't need to rely on a spark/soul anymore.
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Post by Hoist on Apr 4, 2020 16:48:12 GMT -5
It really makes me think of Data's posotronic net/brain, if it was mounted on a device or TF motherboard type equivalent, then theoretically it could be taken out and stored then given to a new body. The question if this was to be instead of sparks would it be moral? Would all TF's then never really die? (Unless it was a severe blow right at that storage point) and be come immortal? I did like the crystal memory engrams in the original Marvel comic (Obviously because of Hoist) so it would be a good way to store stacks or whatever way used to hold that information for further use.
Unfortunately I've never seen Altered Carbon myself.
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Post by Jazzman Crothers on Apr 5, 2020 13:43:22 GMT -5
Altered Carbon is a great show. I did find it a little confusing sometimes. What happens is some characters change bodies and sometimes pretend to be someone else. Sometimes hard to follow. But it's a great sci-fi show, reminds me of Bladerunner sometimes.
So I properly should of made the above post a little better, made it really late the other night. So after a bit of research the thing that holds a Transformer's Memory Engrams is called a Crystalline Containment Vessel or Control Crystal. The memories are stored as pattens of light for long periods of time. (https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Crystalline_containment_vessel)
As you and I know, Optimus Prime used them to create more troops for the Autobot forces on earth when many of his soldiers were out of action in the med lab. But assuming this technology existed on Cybertron long before the Optimus Prime's and Megatron voyage to earth, what was it used for? Was it invented during the great Cybertron war between the Autobots and Decepticons to resurrect fallen soldiers? Or to double their forces with the same Cybertronians? Was it always used as a way to convince Cybertronians to fight in a war where they wouldn't really die when they fell in battle? But if the technology wasn't invented because of the war then what was the reason why? For a library of knowledge to be shared? Or was it to allow a Cybertronian to make copies of it's self so that it could gather more experiences through it's lives and then share those collective experiences into one conscience? Or as a backup incase something bad happened to the individual that resulted in lose of life? If that was the case and the mind had also suffered then the Crystalline Containment Vessel of that individual could be used for a replacement body since the original would be too damaged to be used.
Now theres no mention of what powers the process of copying and transferring a Transformer's Memory Engram from a Crystalline Containment Vessel into a new body. In the Marvel comics, Wheeljack uses a machine called a Mind Bank that transfers the memories from crystal to body. The Mind Bank seems like a regular Cybertronian device but what powers it isn't mentioned. And after it is used that's that, a bunch of Autobot live again. So for all intents and purposes Hoist, Grapple, Smokescreen, Tracks and Skids are alive. There is no mention of the Primal Program or the Primary Program, the life-giving program encoded within the Creation Matrix, actually being used in anyway to transfer the memory engrams or or even used in the creation of the Crystalline Containment Vessels. There is no mention that whatever essences of life that came from the Creation Matrix to create life was then carried and infused into the Crystalline Containment Vessels, but I feel it would be safe to assume it did. The Creation Matrix and the Matrix of Leadership were both made up of crystals and incased in a metal sphere with handles. It would seem that once the Creation Matrix is used to create Transformer life, nothing more is needed except for a body or a Crystalline Containment Vessel to preserve it.
I suppose that there really isn't anything else needed for a Transformer to be alive so to speak. It does leave some unanswered questions in terms of the 7 characteristics of life but life in our point of view as humans has yet to go unchallenged by another alien race who live is an environment different from our own. And in the world of Transformers they do live on a world different from ours. They feel they are alive as much as we feel we are alive.
If I was to write a piece of fiction I have an idea as to what the function of the Crystalline Containment Vessels. Like in the comics they are used to store a Transformer's memories but they would be used with a Transformer's spark to continue their original life cycle. Lets use Hoist as an example since he died in our Renegade RPG and was brought back to life. (How I now forget, that was years ago) So Hoist dies. His spark has found it's way and returned to the Well of Sparks. We want Hoist to come back cause we love him so. So we build him a new body and since Hoist kept a back up of his memories on a Crystalline Containment Vessel, we can use that to resurrect him. We load the Crystalline Containment Vessel with Hoist's memories into Hoist's body, and I mean the physical crystal its self. It acts as a homing device for the spark. We bring Hoist's new body to the Well of Sparks and lower it in. The spark would then home in on the crystal and as it entered Hoist's body the spark would pass through the crystal, unlocking Hoist's memories to be uploaded into the new body's brain. Thus Hoist lives!
So that's how the two could work together. I have some ideas on how they could work if one part of this ritual is missing. If you simply make the deceased a new body and somehow got their spark from the Well of Sparks and placed it into the new body, they then live again but without there memories. It would be like reincarnation. It would be there second life without all the experiences that that made them who they are in their previous life. Now I know that in Transformer lore a spark carries the memories of it's experiences to the Well of Sparks, but that isn't the case here. The Transformer wouldn't have them or couldn't recall them. They may feel like that have lived a life before their current one, sort of like the concept of people being a 'old soul.
Now if you took a Transformer's Crystalline Containment Vessel and loaded it up in a new body for the deceased, or any body for that matter, the result would be a more robotic, drone like being. Devoid of any personality but it retains the memories of a previous life. This could work towards how drones are made. By using a near perfect soldier and duplicating them for an army. Like Jango Fett and the clone army in Star Wars.
I think this could be a useful and dynamic concept to use in Transformers. Though it could also be confusing with all the different methods of how Transformer life is created if mixed in what the lot of them.
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Post by Hoist on Apr 6, 2020 7:14:14 GMT -5
I honestly don't think it's too "Out there" at all with Marvel continuity. Who knows maybe they have a special chamber or core inside them to hold these crystals, but this method is so rarely used they practically never get used because hardly anyone comes back. There always there inside the Transformers (All of them) they're just not talked about because this resurrection (Or use of making clones) is so seldom used? You'd need somewhere pretty special to house all these Crystalline Containment Vessels though!
(In the RP - after Hoist tried to raise the renegade ship that was crashing and ordered everyone off, Indelible went to the crash site and I think managed to extract his spark before it went out. A bit convenient maybe, but it was a for me coming back with a new form and ditch the tow truck once and for all. Anyway It was a similar principle just no Crystalline Containment Vessel, Indelible kept Hoist's spark within himself despite the great enduring long-term pain of housing two sparks at once, until he could rebuild him a new body. Feeling he was too needed to go yet. The implications of housing two sparks would've seriously risked Indelible's long term health and well being. To put into context of time period the Renegade base was then swarmed with zombie bots causing them to have to evacuate and ditch the old HQ)
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Post by Jazzman Crothers on Apr 6, 2020 12:36:16 GMT -5
Holding an extra spark inside? Sounds like some Search for Spock stuff here!
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Post by Hoist on Apr 7, 2020 5:40:12 GMT -5
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Post by Jazzman Crothers on Apr 7, 2020 11:01:02 GMT -5
AaaaaaaHahahahahha!!
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sunder
Spark
On the Prowl
Posts: 25
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Post by sunder on Apr 11, 2020 3:45:34 GMT -5
i liked the idea of 'laser core', though whether this was really just a 'spark' under a different name is uncertain. figured the 'laser core' was something so vital, that its destruction meant death.
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Post by Jazzman Crothers on Apr 11, 2020 19:50:23 GMT -5
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