I saw a post on /r/DeepSpaceNine saying that this year will be the fourth birthday of the Dax Symbiont, and it got me thinking. Even if symbionts are exceptionally long-lived, they're not actually immortal, right? Eventually, they have to get old and die.
But if a host can't survive (at least for long) without the symbiont, what happens? Are they doomed to die with their symbiont? Does the Symbiosis Commission somehow know when a symbiont is near the end of its life and refuse to join it to another host? If so, what happens to that symbiont's memories -- I guess they'd be lost forever?
I have so many questions now. Is there any lore out there that discusses the natural death of a symbiont?
I've thought a lot about this as I find joined Trill really interesting and am not able to find a lot of canon content on their ancient history. So the Trill and symbionts are biologically compatible but how did this strange symbiosis start? This is just a theory but I wouldn't be surprised if the Symbionts started out as parasites or even predators to the Trill. Why else would a Trill cut themselves open to serve as a host? I imagine ancient symbionts were able to forcibly join themselves to a host and could move quickly on land. The Trill, terrorized by the predators, perhaps at some point offered bodies to host the Symbionts. One thing leads to another and they find that the Symbiont carries memories of the former host. That's enough to elevate the importance of these creatures in an ancient culture. It wouldn't surprise me if they basically catered to the Symbionts every need until the Symbionts "devolved" and became the pale, weak, completely dependent species they are today.
BONUS TOPIC: My dream Star Trek villain is one of these ancient symbionts that have survived for thousands of years and can forcibly join with almost any humanoid race. Something carrying the memories of hundreds of Trill, a human, a Romulan, a Klingon... That'd be pretty scary stuff and a good foundation for a big bad in a series.
You all have any cool theories about the symbionts?
Was listening to The Orb podcast in the car earlier and it got me thinking about the Trill. What incentive and/or gains are there for the first host of a symbiont? Aside from memories living on. Being joined like this must not give the host the same experience as the subsequent hosts.
If I was selected for joining and got a new symbiont with no previous hosts I think I’d be pretty annoyed! Thoughts?
Hi,
3 months ago I wrote a post about an opening for a Haskell software engineer in my team. This position is still opened and maybe someone over wants a new start for 2022!
We are looking for someone who is already comfortable with Haskell, the main language used in my team. (we also maintain a small Go application and some system tests are written using Python).
Please have a look at the job description for more details about the company and the technology: https://boards.greenhouse.io/symbiont/jobs/4134418004. You can apply via the Greenhouse website and send me an email directly if you are interested (eric.torreborre@symbiont.io).
This position is opened for remote work if you can align to a US or Europe timezone (the team is currently distributed across EU and Africa, it would be nice to have someone in a US timezone).
I happy to answer questions about our business or the particular flavour of Haskell that we are using on the job :-). Here is a small FAQ from the last post:
> "using blockchain technology"
That was not a question :-) but this needs some precision. We are using a BFT algorithm on a permissioned network. So what are doing is more akin to a decentralized database with its own application language rather than a cryptocurrency system.
> Can I apply from India?
Unfortunately this is too far in terms of timezones.
> What is your team doing exactly?
We are maintaining and evolving the heart of the application logic for the platform, which is the service processing transactions after they have made consensus between all the network nodes. Those transactions are decrypted, verified and some of them are executed using a Virtual Machine supporting our contract language. This updates a local database so that all nodes sharing keys to the same "channel" of communication can see consistent information.
This might not seem like much but there are tons of challenges in making this work reliably, fast and with good support for evolution.
Technically speaking we use a mono-repo with a build system based on Bazel (with some great support from Tweag) and we try to stay on top of GHC's releases.
> What's the salary / contract rate?
This will depend on your seniority and experience according to salary bands (not really in my hands actually :-))
> What are the other teams doing?
... keep reading on reddit ➡The number keeps changing throughout the series. Jadzia mentions seven lifetimes, and Ezri also mentions seven lifetimes.
Here’s something from IMDb that really raises questions.
“The number of Dax hosts Jadzia and Ezri state there have been, fluctuates throughout the series and is usually inaccurate. After Verad became another host in a season 2 episode, and Joran was acknowledged to be a previously-missing host in a season 3 episode, there are 10 hosts in all: Ezri is the tenth, and after Joran and Verad are counted Jadzia is the ninth. Yet Ezri in her only season (7) states she is the eighth, and Jadzia after season 3 usually states SHE is the eighth (counting Joran but forgetting about Verad), though before Joran was discovered (season 3) but after Verad (season 2), Jadzia still says she is the eighth (she counts Verad).”
have we heard anything about dax yet? I know they are focused on Adria right now, but seeing we hear and see trills, and we are seeing and hearing about history and other people in trek's history that we know, has dax been mentioned?
I don't understand how it's possible to separate a past host from the Tal symbiont. Does anybody know exactly how Hugh managed to do it with Gray?
Does this mean it would be possible to separate ANY past host from a symbiont and transfer it to a synth? For example, if the Dax symbiont is still alive in the 32nd century, would it be possible to recreate Jadzia?
I'm starting to play a 3.5e game, my first time playing 3.5, and I've decided on playing a Daelkyr Half-Blood. My first symbiont is going to be the throwing scarab. In reading the description of it, it has the feats: Alertness and Weapon Finesse. My question is whether or not those feats apply to me when it is attached to me. Any help, to include playing this race, would be appreciated.
https://preview.redd.it/ifkwzu2a65e81.jpg?width=527&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b94a54a8b818b90be68cf2b094d7d78149dc7b05
So, I think I'm going to look into a place where I can keep my work off Reddit while still posting links to the them. I heard that Reddit sometimes just takes things and I would like my stories to have the potential to be published someday. I'm open to hearing some common ways people do this, and I hope you enjoy this story.
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The month that passed in preparation for their return went by simultaneously way too quickly and agonizingly slow. The world was kicked into overdrive, production went through the roof, volunteers seemed to sprout from the ground, and training for armed forces that had been selected to enter the aliens had been expedited. You could feel the excitement in the air as everyone wanted a chance to meet an alien or do something that would help them.
A new unofficial branch of the military was created, called the exterminators by those who became a part of it. This was the “branch” that most of the volunteers wanted to be a part of, yet there was much to be done outside of shooting parasites, and plenty of soldiers already present to fill that role. The soldiers who had already been inside of the aliens ran drills on protocol and presented the biology of the parasites to the new recruits who became exterminators, pointing out vital spots on the parasites that will ensure a quick death to them.
Doctors, supported by an army of volunteers, began learning about the biology of the gigantic aliens and how to most effectively treat the wounds and infections that would be present. While those in charge would have preferred if only doctors were allowed to treat the aliens, there were concerns that there would not be enough personnel to do so while still leaving our hospitals operational. Special packs were created that could hold several gallons of disinfectant and neutralizing agents which were hooked up to a misting pump that would spray it over a wide area.
By the time a month had passed, we had armies prepared, not for war, but for medicine. Though to be fair, some claimed it was a war on the parasites, and the internet was doing what i
... keep reading on reddit ➡
Have not seen this topic explored in canon. Symbionts seem to be able to connect in the pools on Trill similar to the Founder’s link. Could the symbionts share thoughts through a shared host?
My first Homebrew Class I've felt happy enough with to post. Probably needs some work, so suggestions are welcome.
The Symbiont is a Pact Caster that draws its powers from a magical parasite, with subclasses that loosely mirror those of the Warlock. A lot of the class features are based on the Warlock ones, with some tweaks. Eldritch Invocations have been replaced by Mutations, which are more closely tied to the Evolution mechanic, this class's version of Pact Boons, than Invocations are with Warlock's Boons. I think this class works well on its own, though it may work better as a campaign's alternative to the Warlock class, since they share quite a bit.
I wanted this class to have access to spells of 6th level and higher, but wanted to keep the spell slot progression the same as Warlock. I also didn't want to just copy Mystic Arcanum. The solution I settled on is quite a bit stronger than Mystic Arcanum: spell points. The Symbiont gets a pool of spell points starting at 11th level that it can use to cast spells of 6th level and higher. In raw power it's the same as Mystic Arcanum, 30 total levels of spells that are regained on a long rest. However their individual point form gives them a lot of versatility, as does the fact that Symbionts prepare a list of higher-level spells, instead of picking one of each.
Yes, you read that correctly: the Symbiont prepares its spells. I thought the idea of a prepared pact-caster was interesting, and allows the Symbiont to rely more on its spells than Warlock usually can, despite having the same number of spell slots. In addition, many of the Mutations ask for specific spells to be prepared for their effects to work, which I hope helps to balance their power.
Balancing was something I didn't worry too much about with this first version. I usually run pretty high-powered campaigns, and am happy to hand out magic items to my players pretty liberally, so I think the Symbiont fits in well with the level of power I'm comfortable with. That being said, I think there's more to be done in that respect, and I'm eager to hear what other people have to say about how this class can be improved and tweaked.
It took me a few weeks to realize that, if I am correct in saying this, a Trill is their own person who happens to have a Symbiont, an organism, attached to them like a fetus except the Symbiont is able to retain all the memories of the Trill host for future hosts.
So it's not some kind of dual personality thing going on, right? Jadzia was just someone with some external influence on who she really was just like Ezri, right? That explains how one of the hosts was a killer and not the others, because Dax has little choice in what the Trill host does.
I think I might still be confused.
In watching DS9 I've been wondering a lot about how distinct of a person Dax is. With Jadzia and later Ezri, it sounds like the most significant part of being joined is the memories, when Ezri first appears on the show the main thing she talks about is suddenly having the memories of all these people, whereas earlier in the show they describe joining as being a melding of the personalities of the host and the symbiont. That begs the question, how much of a personality does the symbiont have, and how much of personality presents itself in a joined trill?
Another question I have is how sentient symbionts are outside of hosts. When Ezri first arrived, she said that Dax took a turn for the worse on the way back to Trill and so they had to do an impromptu joining. Does she remember taking a turn for the worse, as Dax? Do joined Trills remember all the time they spent hanging around in those subterranean pools as unjoined symbionts. Are unjoined symbionts just as sentient and sapient as their Trill counterparts, and other humanoids?
In S5 the Defiant crashes on a planet with a energy barrier around it. Dax and Worf get married a year later and apparently go on happy.
BUT…..
There are many apparent Trills of the 8000 inhabitants. Non of which that look Klingon or are dark skinned with spots. It appears Dax had a possible trist with a more human male and had more trill like offspring to pass the symbiont on to or was there another Trill on board the Defiant? Have we seen any other Trill crewman other than the eventual Ezri?
I ran a Death Shield based Trickster FP build and it was pretty great, but...Fatal Symbiont is such a fun gun to use. I switched to Fatal Symbiont FP trickster build and man...that gun is insane. The RPM is insane, really revitalized the Trickster build for me.
Tradition might say that we should call her Sylvia Tal, but maybe we could get away with Sylvia Tilly Tal. And because she's so bubbly, maybe her students could call her Silly Tilly Tal. Or Silly Sylvia Tilly Tal.
As the title says why does next generation has better picture quality even if its from the 80s, was it remastered?
Also why are trill so eager to infuse themselves with a symbiont. Doesn't it demean their own identity. AFAIK they alter the personality of the host significantly, also there's the previous hosts which bring their traits to the newer host. I find that the unjoined trills have less social value or outcasts.
I don’t know if this is officially stated somewhere.. but since Sisko is always saying to Dax (both Jadzia and Ezere) that “You got more than 300 years experience under your belt” and Star Trek Ds9 is set in the mid to late 2300s wouldn’t it be entirely possible that the first host could have been joined like in our curent year like 2020s or 2030s because that’d be like 300 years. Idk 🤷♀️ just a thought. Does anyone know the exact date on that
The evidence is clear from the third to last supposed host: Senna Tal. Accounting for inevitable translation errors across billions of light years, this is actually “El Senate,” AKA, one Sheev Palpatine.
Sensing his inevitable defeat during TRoS, he cast his essence to another galaxy, where he took possession of a resident Trill, allowing him to inconspicuously pass from generation to generation, plotting galactic conquest.
Grey is NOT in fact a Cylon as originally believed, but a force projection being used to manipulate Adira, as we will learn in the Season 4 finale. Season 5 will center around a galaxy-wide war with the New Sith Empire.
Thanks for listening to my shittiest theory ever.
Hey all- I'm new to online trek communities and watching my way through DS9 now, so if this is an 'asked and answered' situation, just let me know.
I guess I'm just wondering how we know the symbionts aren't straight up body snatchers. Of course the joined trill says that they're both a part of the person- but how do we know that's actually true? The symbiont could really be a parasite who just accesses the host's memories. The host dies after removal of the symbiont, so they never get to tell us. And the whole program for joining could be just an elaborate way for symbionts to guarantee that they get the best hosts- they could be literally culling trill society for the best and brightest.
Maybe a dark read on the situation....
https://preview.redd.it/3344u9zbu4b81.png?width=608&format=png&auto=webp&s=ff08c714d9b72b182f98bfa8c11942642b7b4b33
Hi,
There is an opening in my team for a software engineer. We are looking for someone who is already comfortable with Haskell, the main language used in my team, but also able to dabble in Go, or Python as needed (other services are written in Go and some tests libraries use Python).
Please have a look at the job description for more details about the company and the technology: https://boards.greenhouse.io/symbiont/jobs/4134418004. You can apply via the Greenhouse website and send me an email directly if you are interested (eric.torreborre@symbiont.io).
This position is opened for local (New-York) or remote work, both in the US, Africa and Europe (the team is currently distributed across EU and Africa).
I happy to answer questions about our business or the particular flavour of Haskell that we are using on the job :-).
Thanks,
Eric
