Oh something to add that is less troll biology than troll ectobiology: I have a theory about why Karkat had 24 tubes

Unlike humans who need 1 relationship to reproduce, trolls have 2- 1 kismesis and 1 matespritship.

Therefore, each troll must be entered into the ectobiology machine twice, corresponding to 24 tubes for 12 trolls instead of the kids’ 4 for 4.

I also think this explains something about the 2 generations of trolls- their similarity. It’s stated Karkat and Kankri look genetically identical. Few of the ancestor trolls on Alternia really look overwhelmingly different from their descendants. Furthermore, they all have the same aspect as each other, unlike humans, and they all share symbols, unlike humans. I think all of those trolls were ectobiologized in the copy stage, and that because of the session glitch there was no generation of trolls actually ectobiologized.

Alternatively, Hussie just accidentally put too many tubes in there :P, but I think my theory has interesting nature vs nurture implications vis a vis classes, aspects, and the alpha and beta trolls in general. A theory I’ve had for a while is that Tavros was also going to grow wings at “pupaty” like Rufioh did, but never got to because he didn’t live past 13. The theory enables a lot of cool ideas like that.