Hmm, well we don't know Jaden's origins. The cloning program originated with Thrawn, and Soldier appeared to be their first successful "Prime." Perhaps Jaden was the next clone, which would explain how he built a lightsaber without training. It would also double as a good excuse to get him in the Jedi Order. There's no telling how many of his early memories might be plants or real. What we can consider factual would be that there was a Jaden who trained with Katarn. Perhaps Jaden has been a clone all along, or maybe not even a clone, but an original, Force sensitive, created by melding different subjects DNA. Lots of possibilities.

Given the scar he had on his face as a child, I doubt he was a clone. Sure, that memory could have been implanted, but the Iteration didn't have the scar. Reading the story, I felt that Nyss whispering the code phrase and Jaden not reacting to it was Kemp's way of telling the reader that Jaden was, in fact, the original Jaden.

That's certainly the way I took it. Though I don't discount the idea that the original was abducted by aliens and taken away to a secret cloning facility, and afterwards had his memory wiped. After all, there's mention of the fact that he doesn't remember making the lightsabre, just the reaction from his uncle.

If the Rakatan's "Constructed 'Mother' It is possible that 'Mother' was a prelude to the Star Forge? Here's how I see it. 'Mother' came first, it became sentient, and tried to steal a body to escape. The Rakata abandon 'Mother' and resolve whatever mistakes they made. And construct the Star Forge. We knew that the Forge was at least 'semi-living' since it feeds on the Dark Side, but it was mostly technology, unlike 'Mother' was mostly organic.

The lightsaber shutting off is definitely "ehh." The Ysalamiri don't cause that. I can only assume that some sort of genetic mutation or inherited trait gave the Umbarans the same or a similar ability to the Ysalamiri that they can project like an Interdictor Cruiser, rather than just a constant bubble that the non-sapient Ysalamiri constantly project. Despite the constant EU references, I wonder if Kemp forgot about Ysalamiri, since IIRC, they aren't mentioned. The lightsaber crystals are an evolving thing as each author adds some new thing to it, so I guess it's just something that's true now, and the Umbarans did it "different" than the Ysalamiri. I didn't think that the lightsabers had anything to do with the Force rather than the Jedi using the Force to align the crystal -- and in the original material, IIRC, the crystal was just a one-off mention as a component that has grown in prominence.

I assumed that the Mother was a Rakata construct that achieved sapience, since the StarForge demonstrated that their devices develop sentience. No idea what its original utility was, perhaps just a skyhook or space station or whatever. I'm guessing that the sentience is simply a side effect of the fact that they power their technology with the dark side.

I guess Ben has a half-sister out there somewhere!

I don't think any of their talents were species specific, I think these were unique Force talents to them. Only the twins were capable of disconnecting other users from the Force and shutting down their lightsabers. I think Lomi Plo was also capable of shutting off lightsabers in the Dark Nest Trilogy.

I know, I meant it was a genetic mutation or some sort of inherited trait that was previously unexpressed that gave them the same ability as Ysalamiri, but since they're sapient they can direct it.

But Ysalamiri don't shut off lightsabers, so I guess it's going to be explained as something else. This is just one of the aspects of continuity that I find needlessly complicated because now it needs to account for these discrepancies so it'll be explained as "like Ysalamiri but different" or something like that.

It never made sense to me how Iteration was able to have Jaden's memories. The way Spaarti cloning works, you have to have someone willingly provide a template for the flash learning. This was sort of a plot point in Vision of the Future with the Fel clones, since it was believed that Fel had been killed by the Empire and it wasn't understood how he would have been cloned and how those clones would have been given flash learning with his piloting ability if he wasn't willing.

Unless it was a mindspear that was used to provide the initial input of Jaden's memories in Iteration, but even then how did they get Jaden's memories? Didn't really make sense.

I don't see the Umbarans' ability as any more complicating or necessary of explanation than Lomi Plo's ability in DNT. I certainly don't link it to ysalamiri nor do I think it needs to be. I just look at it as some kind of dark technique. Not everything needs to be explained to death.

Did the iteration initially have Jaden's memories? I don't remember that. I only remember the iteration getting his memories after the mindspear was used. Also, I think the point of it was that we're not suppose to have these answers -- not yet anyway. Personally, I really enjoy the mysteries Riptide presented although I hope they get answered eventually.

Well, when it comes to the Ysalamiri I always thought they were dumb, because Thrawn explains them as repelling the Force and Luke through Mara echoes that in The New Rebellion. And I thought it was dumb that they repel the Force completely. But as Zahn explains in the annotations, plus I think I heard it somewhere else, the Ysalamiri don't eliminate the Force, they just "spread it thin" to such an extent that it's undetectable by Jedi.

Before that, I had thought it tied into the Yuuzhan Vong and the Unifying Force and that the Ysalamiri repelled the Living Force but the Unifying Force remained, which I suppose isn't necessarily mutually exclusive with Zahn's annotation about it. As for the Umbarans, I just thought it would be succinct if what they were doing was the same as the Ysalamiri, but practically applied rather than instinctively. I always thought that what the Ysalamiri do would be something that a Jedi could figure out how to do if he or she tried.

It's kind of ironic that I'm complaining about overusing connections between stories and then complain that the Umbarans aren't connected to Ysalamiri, but I just think it's redundant to have all these Force defeating things. Zahn started the ball rolling with Ysalamiri, and while I think it would be annoying if those get overplayed, to constantly pile on all these supposedly rare Jedi defeating measures with each successive story seems like too much to me. I guess it's not really a big deal. The lightsaber crystal requiring the Force for the lightsaber to function is really dumb though IMO. Lightsabers are technological, not mystical. I don't remember Lomi Plo doing it so I'll have to check that out.

As for Iteration, when he was first removed from suspended animation he thought he was Jaden, then Nyss put the Iteration information into him with the mindspear and he knew he was a clone, then Nyss put him back in suspended animation, the point being to ensure the clone could handle the mindspear.