Q:
Sylvari Biology?
They are genderless, I think. I mean, they can’t reproduce.
Their biology matches a humans but it is made of different stuff, sap, chlorophyll sacks (dunno if that is a thing I am no expert on plants). They are a physical mimicry of humans, but they are different enough to have their own form of specialist doctors to treat their wounds.
They are genderless, I think. I mean, they can’t reproduce.
sterile does not mean you have no gender, it only means you cannot reproduce. Sylvari are entirely anatomically correct for their sex. They just…..“shoot blanks” so to speak
Sylvari are a mimicry of human anatomy but made up of plant material. They have wood for bones, vines for muscle and leaves for hear and skin. In addition Sylvari can actually grow clothing on their body from nodules.
Sylvari, however dont reproduce in the same manner as other humanoids. Infact we dont know if Sylvari have any ability to reproduce in the long run or if they are ‘workers’ and the pale tree reproduces by producing special seeds like ‘queen’ seeds that grow into new pale trees.
This is partially because we have no real idea if their are later stages to a Sylvari’s lifecycle. For all we know after a few hundred years a Sylvari could become ‘rooted’ and metamorph into a stationary tree.
Being plantlife they biology is fairly different from human even if its a copy. They are after all plants.
Sylvari do Photosynthesis but they dont rely on it for energy because being moving and active plants they burn alot of energy. As a result, like other humaniods, they have a digestive system though its probably somewhat different in function. Over all the end result is the same. A sylvari in the sun will often feel more energetic but they would probably still starve without eating.
Sylvari do have internal organs. They just don’t appear recognizable to a mammal’s internal organs. They have an organ that functions like a stomach (digests food), but it isn’t a stomach; they have an organ that functions like a heart (circulates the sap), but they don’t have an actual heart. This is what Ree meant – they don’t have the organs we have. But they have organs which fulfill similar/the same roles. They’re also in different placements, iirc from what was said, so if you go stab a sylvari where the human heart is, you may end up just piercing their psuedo-stomach.
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Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
not sure if there’s anything new in here, but it might be worth a look.
They’re also in different placements, iirc from what was said, so if you go stab a sylvari where the human heart is, you may end up just piercing their psuedo-stomach.
“Ow, my glubok!”
“A man who trusts everyone is a fool.
And a man who trusts no one is a fool.
We are all fools, if we live long enough.”
And a man who trusts no one is a fool.
We are all fools, if we live long enough.”
I remember reading that their sap (blood) is yellow.
“Never leave a wrong to ripen into evil”.
Sylvari do have internal organs. They just don’t appear recognizable to a mammal’s internal organs. They have an organ that functions like a stomach (digests food), but it isn’t a stomach; they have an organ that functions like a heart (circulates the sap), but they don’t have an actual heart. This is what Ree meant – they don’t have the organs we have. But they have organs which fulfill similar/the same roles. They’re also in different placements, iirc from what was said, so if you go stab a sylvari where the human heart is, you may end up just piercing their psuedo-stomach.
Are we sure they have a “heart”? I thought they don’t have a pulse….
Sap flows somehow. Just because their sap is flowing though doesn’t mean that you could feel it on their leafy skin.
plants don’t have hearts, yet they transport sap and water throughout the plant using their xylem and phloem, which in turn use adhesion and cohesion, along with a “source and sink” movement.
@Icarus Pherae.4680: Technically, no. But I’d imagine that movement of sap would be different than other plants given how they’re more active and differently shaped.
I remember reading that their sap (blood) is yellow.
Golden, but yes.
Dear ANet writers,
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
which is a fair point konig, one thing we can also remember is that our own bodies rely on the movement of limbs (much more than we realize often) to “compress” blood back to our trunk. This is also another perfectly good way to move sap (which is much thicker than blood I would think). But this is all just conjecture anyways since I doubt anybody (even the devs) know what the sap actually does functionally.
Only us lore crazed loonies take the time to think about such things :P
Honestly though Icarus, now you’ve got me thinking… Plats saps usually carry around nutrition, if I remember correctly, as well as pigments to colour the leaves. They also just keep everything hydrated…
Also I was wondering… Do Sylvari eat for fun or really eat because they need it? I always imagined them to live on photosynthesis…
They are too active to subsist on photosynthesis, the devs have said that they do eat much like the other races. Sap generally consists of the sugars produced from photosynthesis that is stored in the roots. A typical plant has both xylem and phloem, which are both pathways throughout the plant for transport(similar to our blood stream). One transports water which is used to keep the plant turgid (not wilting) and used in photosynthesis. The other transports sap to the roots.
My statement was more referring to not knowing what sylvari sap does, because we can’t be certain it serves the same purpose.
Sylvari require food and drink to live, as Icarus said, but they still undergo photosynthesis. Though the extent of it is feeling a bit lethargic in the dark and a bit more energetic in the sunlight.
“A man who trusts everyone is a fool.
And a man who trusts no one is a fool.
We are all fools, if we live long enough.”
And a man who trusts no one is a fool.
We are all fools, if we live long enough.”
I like Konig Des Todes first answer. A-net describes sylvari as being the Pale trees interpretation of human but they also say she only saw the outside of humans. So she wouldn’t knoiw how we operate internally. So that would mean any plant organs they have internally are made to replicate functions rather than exact one-for-one human organs. e.g.: something that acts as a stomache to digest food, some sort of process to move sap (whether that is one organ like a heart or severl interworking mechanics), etc.
Well, as near as I can interpret this, Sylvari are the Pale Tree’s best approximate ‘copy’ to a humanoid shape which the Asura went over in a explanation about how the bodies’ of Ronan’s family gave the Pale Sapling a basic blueprint for her race. So, the body would be the same but made of different materials as mentioned before e.g. vines for muscles, bark for skin, you get the idea. That means that, in theory, that the ‘equipment’ should be there and it should work the same but the reproductive organs that humans have, Sylvari don’t have a plant equivalent since plant reproduction is different from animal reproduction.
This may be slightly off topic, and I don’t know if anyone has mentioned anything about this, but perhaps the old theory about the Pale Tree using the mass human grave she was planted on as a template for the sylvari. In the HoT, there were ‘Blighted Tree’, which are literally was the Pale Tree was supposed to have become, which often used the corpses of other creatures to make more Mordrem. Its very plausible that the Pale Tree did something similar. Though, that may not explain Malyck and his version of the Tree…I would love to find out how Mordy effected him and his people.
Hate is Fuel.
Literally the post above yours mentions that…
Dear ANet writers,
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
Literally the post above yours mentions that…
Ok, thanks.
Hate is Fuel.
At some point there existed a seed for the Pale Tree, not only that, it was one of many. Ronan only took one as he had to fight plant monsters to get it… or so the story goes. Can the Pale Tree make seeds? You could farm an army of Sylvari in theory.
Actually, it’s never said Ronan fought those plant monsters. Just that the seeds were being guarded.
Dear ANet writers,
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
Sylvari do have internal organs. They just don’t appear recognizable to a mammal’s internal organs. They have an organ that functions like a stomach (digests food), but it isn’t a stomach; they have an organ that functions like a heart (circulates the sap), but they don’t have an actual heart. This is what Ree meant – they don’t have the organs we have. But they have organs which fulfill similar/the same roles. They’re also in different placements, iirc from what was said, so if you go stab a sylvari where the human heart is, you may end up just piercing their psuedo-stomach.
Are we sure they have a “heart”? I thought they don’t have a pulse….
Well we know other Mordrem have hearts why not Sylvari?
Sylvari do not have hearts, or so was said when a dev got asked at a convention – long after my post that you quoted by about a year and a half.
Dear ANet writers,
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
Surely they have an equivalent organ for moving their “blood” throughout their bodies?
Hate is Fuel.
Given that sap moves slowly and isn’t pumped in plants, I’d argue: no.
Dear ANet writers,
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.
Well.. it depends on how nitpicky we are and how we want to believe Sylvari operate on a biologic level. In RL it would never be possible to build a organism out of plantcells which has the capabilities of a faunal organism for many reasons – how tissues are created and cells are tightly connected and can’t be interchanged as in animals, etc.pp.
A other issue would be the slowness of tracheidal and parenchymal cell-to-cell transport. These transportmechanisms just can’t handle the fast supply of oxygen and nutritions and fast removal of waste products a “brain” or “muscles” in these organisms would need. So you could argue a Sylvari would need something as a pump to accelerate the flow velocity in its tracheids to create something similar to a bloodstream. On the other hand its confirmed they have a thick sap, so that wouldn’t be possible anyway and – its a fantasy universe. The utter maximum-velocity any cell can grow is about 50 µm/min (2 milli-inch) – due to physical laws of how fast proteins and lipids for the cellstructure and surface can be synthesized and vesicels can flow where they are needed. Still Mordremoth is able to grow 100 metres of vines in a matter of seconds, and wounds can be healed in notime – so.. magic! and there have to be other physical laws regarding how fast stuff can flow and build up in cells within the GW universe, what would make it possible for Sylvari to just rely on their super-parenchym to provide their muscles.
(edited by Amraston.2846)