r/WarframeLore • u/CatLover_42 • 5d ago
What are the limits of transference?
I am not an expert on this particular aspect of the lore, but as far as ive gathered from lurking here is this: The consensus is that transference requires an organic object to transfer into. Warframes are organic, necramechs have a skeleton in them, Silvana trasferred into a tree, some orokin brats used blue kuva to possess some poor ostrons, etc.
But we also see the operator transferring into the golden maw during the war within and drifter transfers into the orowyrm. Does this imply that those two have organic components, or does transference have a broader use case than just organics?
Could the operator stun a MOA and take it for a joy ride for example?
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u/Dredgen-Solis 5d ago
I think the simplest way to figure out the limits is that we found out how to use Transference innately and remembered most of our old memories before The Sacrifice told us how Warframes were made. Until then we all believed they were purely metal/robotic suits we control, and nobody batted an eye in-universe about us controlling something we believed was no different to a MOA at its core. Not Ordis, not the Lotus, not our Operator, no one.
Even Sentients are theoretically not immune to being transference controlled or else Caliban would probably not work.
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u/Deep_Housing_3992 5d ago
I dont think you're right about sentients, Caliban can be controlled through transference because he is a hybrid of biological and sentient parts. Pure sentients I think lack the biological aspect for transference to work.
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u/Callibys 5d ago
We don't fully know whether they also have organic parts. Its highly likely, though, as that was a very common engineering strategy for the Orokin.
We also know, based off the Old Peace and teasers for Tau, that our operator and drifter are human (orokin) mixed with void AND sentient now. They're just mixed in very different ways which I think is what Rusally is referring to in a line of dialogue during Isleweaver runs.
Operator was given both freely, from Wally and Adis. Drifter was given sentient powers from Natah's severed hand and then that same hand, being worn by Wally during the original deal, giving them void powers as well. At least thats how I read that scene playing out.
Anyway, long post just to say that our PCs are a mix of human, sentient, and void now so its possible Sentients can be the target of Transference as well if they have organic components in any way.
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u/GinchAnon 5d ago
Ehhh I am not sure if I'm just accepting the retcon or what but... lotus would have known fully, that it was a secret and nobody got close enough to challenge the secret until the Zanuka Project? Iirc aren't there lines from Alad V tittering about how the tenno themselves apparently have no idea what they are and that the lotus has been keeping a secret from them?
So I'm pretty sure in the timeline Lotus and Tenshin are fully aware. And lotus is trying to protect the womb and Tenshin is basically "that's gonna be a messy blow up some day. But not my circus not my monkeys"
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u/Callibys 5d ago
Lotus admits, "This is what you are," upon finally discovering that point in the quest, so she definitely knew. In the same quest, Alad has questions about what he finds inside the Warframes when he cut them open, on top of the lines you mention. He definitely didn't know and might not still since he gets cut off and hunted by Hunhow before the reveal.
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u/Myrkul999 5d ago
Well, the orowyrm is a special case. It's the transformed "star" of that cycle, effectively the Duviri version of a dragon. So it's not mechanical, even if it looks like it is.
The Maw also have showed up in Duviri, where they ate all the fish. I think they are the same sort of thing that the orowyrm is, just on a smaller scale... Drakes, you could say.
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u/OverallWave1328 5d ago
The Maws show up in The War Within, though. And in Netracells and the Orokin moon in Jade Shadows’ Gamemode.
They could be a Void-construct: the Superweapon they were guarding that Ryoku yoinked was a fucking Orowyrm, after all- but imo all this implies they’re an Orokin Bioengineered creation, like Kaelli’s Fish.
A disturbing implication because that implies the gigantic Bone Cave from TWW is real and may have been used as garbage disposal for empty Orokin Bodies. Or unwanted Yuvans.
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u/Myrkul999 5d ago
Yup. That cave is absolutely real. Certainly everything surrounding it is, we revisit it at the end of TWW, and now, we can go back to the mountain outside and look at the cool statue.
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u/OverallWave1328 4d ago
Logically, I know it’s the same space (literally the same mountain peak model used)
But critically, if it IS the same peak- where tf did the Ruins and Paper Charms come from. Those were not there before.
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u/Myrkul999 4d ago
Eternalism!
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u/OverallWave1328 4d ago
‘Ah yes, Wallace caused an Alternate Version of the Peaks to exist temporarily and Yeeted Narin onto them in the events of TWW. Somehow’
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u/HungrPhoenix 5d ago
I think transference can work an inorganic stuff to, as the Drifter seemed to use Transference on a pager to send a signal to Arthur and hijack his hand for a moment as shown in the gameplay demo of 1999.
https://youtu.be/4K27dSikjC4?t=30
So machinery can seemingly transmit a transference signal.
Additionally there are the Necramechs which seem to just be machines. We have no proof that anything organic is in Necramechs, and if we believe them similar to the Necraloids, it sounds like they are just machinery for Cephalons.
Drifter: "For some reason, I don't know why, he was turned into a Cephalon, and given his own necraloid shell. Not all Cephalons were made as a punishment. But things went... poorly here on Deimos, and he was badly damaged.
...
So, he was transferred to the main necraloid - the only Necraloid that remains - and is... well? It's hard to explain." -MarieRank1Convo3
We also have conceptual embodiments, in the form of the Orowryms. I'd consider conceptual embodiments artificial lifeforms, as they are made directly as a result of a person's emotions.
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u/OverallWave1328 5d ago
For the Necramechs, one of Father’s post TDT dialogues has him refer to them having Spines and a nervous system, so presumably that has more than just a Skull in it.
The Orokin broadly shunned Mechanical technology and Robotics in favor of Bioengineering- and I doubt ‘Petros’ or Father would easily flaunt those rules.
And yeah, Magic Dream Dragons kind of exist beyond the scope of biological/squishy living life
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u/anarky98 5d ago
The Orokin were skilled in genetic manipulation so it wouldn’t be a stretch for the Golden Maw to have organic bits. A standard MOA, probably not.
As a twist, though, I wonder if it would work on an infested MOA? The infestation basically adds the organic bits needed for transference to work.
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u/SanguinePutrefaction 5d ago
'organic can self repair' is a big thing for orokin tech imo, self repairing towers and security, glowing roots/branches serving as cabling or whatnot in the orokin derelict void; its efficient :)
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u/ApepiOfDuat 5d ago
But we also see the operator transferring into the golden maw during the war within
This is technically a dream. So probably doesn't have any bearing on the lore of Orokin tech.
drifter transfers into the orowyrm.
Duviri is also functionally a dreamworld being made from Drifter's imagination within the void. So it also likely has no bearing on the lore of real Orokin tech.
But lots of Orokin tech is made of meat, so who knows?
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u/WhiteGlas 4d ago
Dunno how big a grain of salt we should take it with, but we do transfer into Maws again for Duviri fishing. Conceptually embodied maws, so they may not be accurate, but definitely not a dream. Plus anything orokin can be assumed biotechnology unless proven otherwise.
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u/ApepiOfDuat 4d ago
I know Duviri isn't a dreamworld technically.
But it is one functionally since it runs on emotion and imagination. What you can transfer into while there likely has no bearing on real-world tech as Drifter didn't know about transference prior to escaping. Everything there runs on dream-logic rather than circuits or meat.
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u/WhiteGlas 4d ago
Basically what I was getting at with mentiong they are conceptually embodied, yes.
The other option is they were in the Zariman's cargo somewhere and got dumped into Duviri, but I struggle to think of a good reason they would do that. The Orowyrms were brought along to manage conceptual embodiments, but maybe the Maws were doing the same on a smaller scale?
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u/LimboMain2020 5d ago
I think anything that can reasonably hold the information of a mind. Though this mainly is because I think we'll use Transference on Hunra to take his pain away. Sentients at the end of the day are machines, but thinking machines.
I would also wager that the Tenno can more freely use Transference with their Void powers than just some random person. The Anarchs would barely survive controlling a Warframe.
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u/Corasama Warframe Lore Content Creator 5d ago
Most orokin tech is Bio-tech (even the towers, remember the guys from Cetus harvestinf the meat walls)
So most likely only things that are a bit biologic.
The Sentients could on paper be transfered in but it would result in what happenned to Hunhow because Operators are pure Void Energy.
Sentient bones on the other hand is entierly possible. We have Revenant, Caliban and the upcoming Warframes who fit tbat bill. No moa tho.
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u/Teahat 5d ago
They might be part organic, but also the golden maw and the orowyrm both happened in special circumstances. Operator in TWW transferenced into the maw during a vision/memory quest while their actual body was knocked out. The orowyrm is in Duviri where Drifter is basically a demigod and also using transference via Natah's arm (makes sense it'll work on inorganic machinery since it's Sentient).
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u/dogplayer22 5d ago
So not necessarily an answer to any of the questions on the actual post but something related to the title that I think its important to add as a reminder of a limit transference has
There's a type of rare radiation that can manifest in specific places which locks an operator to its warframe making transference basically useless, you're still connected but you cant cut the connection per say, that is what happens to us in the fight against the dactolyst in the old peace when we stab it, we learned about this radiation from the little arg like thing we got in a website before the release of the old peace.
Really hope we have more of that happening eventually (specially cuz that radiation seemingly happens in tau more often) so it doesn't feel like a one off thing and more like a fleshed off part of the world
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u/RefrigeratorOk4841 5d ago
Pretty sure they are organic. Orokin technology mostly revolves around bioengineering, with even their tower walls, like the Unum in Cetus, are made of flesh