Troll Reproduction

[javitaxy]

Hello, I have a question regarding troll reproduction. Basically, if it would work without the Mother grub.
As context, I'm writing a fanventure where trolls conquer different planets, but I doubt they would bring a Mother grub or Matriorb to each planet they reach, so that got me wondering. How exactly would they settle down and leave offsprings?
And in that term, how exactly do their genitalia work? We know trolls do have 2 sexes, with very slight differences but with the same functionality. Their reproduction is "bisexually" (as Aranea states) which means a pair of females, a pair of males or a female/male couple can form an offspring (or is this just in the case of Mother grub reproduction?). If that's the case, then how do their gametes work? Even if didn't have any difference in morphology (as in egg cell and sperm), females would only produce XX children, and males would produce XX, XY or YY (but YY's don't exist? uhh). I have doubts whether this is how it works or not.*
The other possibility would be that they produce both types of gametes, but that would make them hermaphrodites, which is not the case (Kanaya mentions some "cattle"(don't remember) being hermaphrodites, she wouldn't make that differenciation if trolls weren't themselves), plus that would mean everyone would be the same sex? Which we have seen is not true since there are differences between them, most notably breasts.

*=I just read about heterothallic isogamy which could work if stated in a specific way. Isogamy (even though it's only present in plants/fungi) is a type of reproduction where gametes are morphologically similar, and are regulated by mating types (most commonly + and -) which regulate compatibility between gametes. Mating types and sexes can exist simultaneously in one individual. So maybe, regardless of sex, they would be able to produce both + and - gametes, which would form an offspring. And if it were to work as something like the + gamete providing the X or Y chromosomes and the - gamete only having an X chromosome, then that would... make sense? At least it does in my head. I definitely am not an expert in biology at all (the only knowledge I have is school stuff) and heterothallism is just present in plants (though it did possibly evolve to anisogamy) and all but you know what? I'm satistfied enough with this. I really should stop researching so much for a simple detail in my story. This isn't the first time for this fanventure tho... jesus

Anyway, if anyone has a better answer to how trolls would reproduce without the Mother Grub... Please let me know

[javitaxy]

Just realised, maybe it's just impossible for trolls to bear their own children. I guess they're just parasitic beings that make other species (Mother grub) lay their eggs. They don't bring Mother Grubs to other planets because grubs are born in their own... Motherlands? (like Alternia). They populate their conquered planets with adult trolls who leave Alternia.
Though hmm I wonder how they did it when drones weren't a thing... How did primitive trolls do it without buckets? Insert ther genetic material to the MG?

God, am I overthinking this again

[conceived_twist]

I have some similar questions when it comes to how Alternan Empire works that out. They conquer planets all the time, yet what do they even do with them? Do Troll populations live outside of the home planet or not?

[BrobyDDark]

I believe they just enslave the populace of the planets they conquer. The adults stay on the ships, and the kids stay on Alternia until they're old enough to go to war.

They remind me of the Saiyans, actually, with the Empress being Frieza. So I imagine they don't have much in the way of personal freedom, and they loyally follow who has the most resources, in this case Hi-C Fruit Punch.


As for Troll Reproduction, I've always theorized that they ARE capable of human-esque reproduction, but then there's a way to control who gets what blood color, so the grub and the robots with buckets were set up so commoner trolls don't breed their way to fuschia blood within several generations.

[loomingDoom]

Oooookay so I have 2 personal answers for you which could help you. One that could very well be canon but doesn't answer all of your question. And one that's a headcanon of mine.

Lets start with the potentially canon one.

One- (The one that could very well be canon) There's no way for them to reproduce without Mothergrubs

At the point they are in their evolution and genetic divergence between the 12 bloods. I don't think they can reproduce with just troll on troll action. That said for the buckets and the drones. I would say without those. The vestigial organs that they have that resemble human female genitals may be used for genetical fluid transportation AI the troll store it in what used to be like an Uterus which would now be a pouch. That is how i think they would have transported the genetic fluid before buckets and drones, when things were more primitive and when the invention of tools started, They simply started to do it with buckets.

Two- (My headcanon) The only Trolls i see able to reproduce without Mothergrubs are Jade bloods.

We know all blood colors have physiological difference on some level given the lower bloods live less long and are generally weaker physically and how some bloods are prone to psychic powers some aren't and some for different type of psychic powers. Have some genetic divergence or unique traits. Gold Blood with Twice as Many Horns. Jade being able to revive as Rainbow Drinkers. Seadwellers. Cerulean prone to eye mutations which seems to be mostly a female thing (If we compile all canon characters that are Cerulean from Homestuck and Friendsim. Only female shave abnormal eyes and only those with abnormal eyes have psychic powers) and so on.

So you can on some level consider every troll blood as subspecies of troll or like how you have different dog breed. They're all dogs but they have very different physics based on their breed. SO I believe Jades being the troll blood being the one designated as the caretakers of the new generation of trolls, to grubs and such. That if any trolls should be able to reproduce without Mothergrubs it would be them but more as a latent ability that manifest when there are no Mothergrub present or simply not as efficiently as Mothergrubs given those can give birth to MANY grubs in large batches while a Jade would only be able to have 1 or 2 at the time max and also would offer a much less genetically diverse trolls.

My reasoning is this. We know that the fluids are transported and then mixed in huge batches. So most likely all blood colors are in those mixes and all these mix guaranty trolls of all blood color that are included in the mix. I doubt a Small Jade compared to a BIG Mothergrub can hold a significant amount of all 12 color of fluids to give birth to grubs (yes i include Limes in this as I'm assuming a general case) So Jade may only use 2 or 3 fluid color max as to not confuse their "Inferior" reproductive capacity compared to Mothergrubs and promote a more traditional way of a couple having a kid.

You can also see it as to why Jades are so prized and protected. Protected as they mostly never leave the Brooding Caverns because their job is important for the whole species survival and prize because of how rare they are and in this case from the past of maybe before Mothergrubs where reproduction would be through Jades which well wouldn't be exactly fun for them. You could also use that as to shed light on why well things in Homestuck with the Dolorosa and such happened which would mean a rather fucked up/abusive past for Jades.

I personally see it as a thing Jades can't do when there are mother grubs around because of the way Trolls seem to have strong connections to Alternia's wild life like Lusii and Mothergrubs so Jades could have a sort of subconscious thing that prevent troll on troll reproduction if there are Mother Grubs around. Could be explained through how insect communicates through pheromones and given Trolls do seem to have a strong Insect like basis. Jades would only begin to be able to reproduce troll on troll only when their body doesn't detect a certain pheromone mother grubs would emit.

I get it i put too much thought into troll reproduction don't @ me XD

I'd like to know your thoughts and if what i said helped at all.

[javitaxy]

@loomingDoom If we go with the "canon" answer, I guess they'd just have a symbiotic relationship with the mothergrub, to the point where they can't exist without it (Idk what the mothergrub really wins from the relationship though? maybe caretaking). I guess yeah, they just evolved as species to be like that, and the had to carry the fluids somehow without the buckets/drones.

Also, I like your headcanon! I thought maybe it couldn't work bc of the difference in each caste, but if they're like "dog breeds", and since they're the same species, I think it's possible. Also, maybe since they can only do it in "emergencies" where a mothergrub isn't present, maybe it's too dangerous for jades. I guess the process would mean their death? Another difference would be hmm... That the mothergrubs don't insert their dna, but if it's inside a jade troll, maybe they do end up with some of their dna? I dunno how the mixture of blood thing really works though, so... :shrug:

Thanks for your answer, and I think it's fun to think about stuff like this ahhaha

[loomingDoom]

Trolls do have a strong symbiotic relationship with most of the fauna of their home planet, even each other. The implication of a troll collective unconscious by which psionic powers acts given Vriska and Aranea cannot mind control humans, only put them to sleep shows Trolls powers are more compatible with trolls. The collective nightmares given by the purples and so on. The fact that trolls can communicate with their lusii. Clearly Mothergrubs and lusii are part of the Troll Species as whole so yes i would say the benefit Mothergubs gets is being so important that they are protected by Trolls.

As for my headcanon. I would say it brings the same risk of typical human pregnancy. I wouldn't go as far as to say a Jade giving birth would outright kill them otherwise it would severely impair the actually purpose of last resort reproduction which is to keep the species alive. Because think about this. If Jades can only give birth to one or 2 trolls at a time and then die. Then you no longer have Jades to reproduce with given you have less then 1 in 12 chance of the new troll being Jade if you have actually used genetic fluids from all 12 trolls. We know that troll reproduction is heavily skewed toward producing Burgundy bloods and Jade themselves are rare for their position in the hemospectrum.

The downside is that they can't mass reproduce with Jades, its one at a time mostly rather then in large batches. As for the fluid mixing. think about it this way. Troll reproduction's difference is that the reproductive organs don't genetically contributes. It only serves the purpose of a "Copy machine" give the data and it produce the result. Trolls don't get any DNA from the Mothergrubs so they wouldn't get any DNA from the Jade unless said Jade did contribute their own genetic material in the mix.

The mix this is this. Think of how BIG a Mothergrub is compared to a Troll so it can be given much much more fluids to use as the information for producing grubs. Its why i think a Jade can't be given a mix of all 12 blood because then instead of example 1 litter of Olive and Purple fluid which is 50% each to work with which is what you typically would get in a human as in both parent contribute 50% with 12 blood you get 8.3% of the fluid per blood color which i would assume for a Jade's size is not enough for their reproductive organ to be able to use the Genetic information per blood to produce a troll. Because of the simple fact that Trolls always fall in the category of 12 blood, not mix of all 12 or less.

If you contribute only Olive and Purple fluid. You don't get a Purple Olive troll but either a purple or an Olive which may have physical appearance similar to the Purple or Olive provider. So the process must include a choosing process where the organs take some information from one color of genetic fluid and some other information from the other. It would work fine for a Mothergrub who's so big and so have more complete samples of all 12 color of fluids but for a Jade, they wouldn't be able to intake enough of the 12 genetic fluid to have enough DNA to produce any viable troll.

Np and honestly yeah its fun to talk about this.

There's 2 more question tho. One is one that Arquius was gonna talk about which is what Troll Breasts are for which Dirk stopped him from explaining XD

And the second is... would only Female Jade be able to give birth? Heck what's the % of male to female trolls in each blood color. Because i ran some numbers a while back based on all shown trolls with canon signs so Homestuck trolls (Minus Alpha, Ancestors and such, just beta cus they're all genetic repeats) and Friendsim trolls and this is the results. Also sorry in advance for including Lanque in females. This is purely based off of sex at birth for the purpose of determining the male to female birth sex ratio. This is in no mean meant to disrespect trans people and Lanque being male. Even tho Lanque is a piece of shit XD

Anyway here goes



-Fuchsia
I personally believe the Fuchsia cast to be exclusively female at birth given the insect association of Trolls weather its bee or ants or else. Typically when having insectoid aliens they have a "Queen" not as elected but genetically a queen in some sense
-Violets
Inconclusive. Only Eridan, Cronus and their adult counterpart were ever shown as Violets so there is not enough data
-Purples
If we believe some of the Alpha trolls about troll society being "Male dominated" or "Patriarchal" despite always having an Empress. This is where it stems given the roles of Purples in Troll Society which is to subjugate the population
-Indigo
It also fits given what i said for purples. Also being the second top cast on land
-Cerulean
Now this one's interesting. Mallek is the only Male Cerulean shown. Then Only Females are shown with strange eyes and only one of them doesn't seem to have a psychic power
-Teal
Not much to say
-Jades
Now this one is also interesting. Only once in Homestuck itself was it ever said that there are Male Jade from Kanaya. I don't remember the context But Given Troll Society being very relax on gender issues Kanaya could be referring to Trans Jades so yes there would be male Jades just not male at birth jades if you follow this sex distribution
-Olive
Not much to say, seems to be female dominated
-Lime
I don't include Karkat in this one so we have 0 information
-Gold Bronze Burgundy
They seems to be male dominated

From my observations from the Beta Trolls and Friendsim Cast which i could say are the only "Official" trolls the middle of the hemospectrum seems to be more Female dominated and the extremities to be more males with the exception of Fuchsia.

If this observation is true it would mean that even if only female Jades can reproduce, it wouldn't matter because there are only female at birth Jades but if there are male at birth Jades then the question is relevant... Because we know there are differences between males and females but they don't seem to play a role in reproduction in canon. So... would Male Jades be able to give birth?

Also if anything of what i said regarding sex and genders for trolls is wrong or not properly said and upset anyone. It wasn't my goal and I apologize, simply point to me what i can rewrite to accommodate better. My goal isn't to upset any trans people. I just don't know if I tackled the subject well.

[javitaxy]

Breasts have been subject of discussion for a long while (god that sounds weird) regarding trolls. Since they're not mammals, they don't seem to serve a function? I guess we'll never know.

And regarding the other question... I guess male jades (at birth) would be able to give birth, but we don't really know the extent of their body differences? Hmm so I dunno.

Also, we do have a female violet: Cridea Jeevik. And I think you counted Charun as a male olive, when they're nb.

[loomingDoom]

I didn't count her cus i haven't played Hiveswap but thanks. As for Charun I think I counted them as Male because of like i said i'm counting at birth sex and i think I saw somewhere that male is their sex at birth. The statistics are about sex at birth, not gender cus don't worry i know Charon is Non Binary, I just forgot to mention them in my reasoning.

So in conclusion then Violet is 50-50 only because of well "2" characters ever shown and one of each sex.

If male female sex doesn't differ enough beside small physical variation then I guess Male Jades would be able to give birth which well for trolls wouldn't be weird given its what they know :p

The breast subject is intriguing because of the fact that Arquius brought the subject up and him being "Half human" so he knows there's a difference from humans and a specific use but we will never know. Knowing Hussie it might be something dumb XD Or the AR side knew Dirk would react the way he did so he just brought the subject to mess with him

[javitaxy]

Oh, I didn't know Charun was male at birth. And yeah, Arquius must have been messing with Dirk, who knows.

[loomingDoom]

Well i'm not sure. But its what I remember reading around. And yeah He could have just been messing with him.

[zealousZombie]

Two- (My headcanon) The only Trolls i see able to
reproduce without Mothergrubs are Jade bloods.

We know all blood colors have physiological difference on some level given the lower bloods live less long and are generally weaker physically and how some bloods are prone to psychic powers some aren't and some for different type of psychic powers. Have some genetic divergence or unique traits. Gold Blood with Twice as Many Horns. Jade being able to revive as Rainbow Drinkers. Seadwellers. Cerulean prone to eye mutations which seems to be mostly a female thing (If we compile all canon characters that are Cerulean from Homestuck and Friendsim. Only female shave abnormal eyes and only those with abnormal eyes have psychic powers) and so on.

So you can on some level consider every troll blood as subspecies of troll or like how you have different dog breed. They're all dogs but they have very different physics based on their breed. SO I believe Jades being the troll blood being the one designated as the caretakers of the new generation of trolls, to grubs and such. That if any trolls should be able to reproduce without Mothergrubs it would be them but more as a latent ability that manifest when there are no Mothergrub present or simply not as efficiently as Mothergrubs given those can give birth to MANY grubs in large batches while a Jade would only be able to have 1 or 2 at the time max and also would offer a much less genetically diverse trolls.

My reasoning is this. We know that the fluids are transported and then mixed in huge batches. So most likely all blood colors are in those mixes and all these mix guaranty trolls of all blood color that are included in the mix. I doubt a Small Jade compared to a BIG Mothergrub can hold a significant amount of all 12 color of fluids to give birth to grubs (yes i include Limes in this as I'm assuming a general case) So Jade may only use 2 or 3 fluid color max as to not confuse their "Inferior" reproductive capacity compared to Mothergrubs and promote a more traditional way of a couple having a kid.

You can also see it as to why Jades are so prized and protected. Protected as they mostly never leave the Brooding Caverns because their job is important for the whole species survival and prize because of how rare they are and in this case from the past of maybe before Mothergrubs where reproduction would be through Jades which well wouldn't be exactly fun for them. You could also use that as to shed light on why well things in Homestuck with the Dolorosa and such happened which would mean a rather fucked up/abusive past for Jades.

I personally see it as a thing Jades can't do when there are mother grubs around because of the way Trolls seem to have strong connections to Alternia's wild life like Lusii and Mothergrubs so Jades could have a sort of subconscious thing that prevent troll on troll reproduction if there are Mother Grubs around. Could be explained through how insect communicates through pheromones and given Trolls do seem to have a strong Insect like basis. Jades would only begin to be able to reproduce troll on troll only when their body doesn't detect a certain pheromone mother grubs would emit.

I get it i put too much thought into troll reproduction don't @ me XD

I'd like to know your thoughts and if what i said helped at all.

Yeah I Can Really See That Happening And I Tjink It Would Be Very Likely IF They Didn't Have The Matriorb (However You Spell It)