Perception, Spren, & Spikes

[Trusk'our he/him]

Spren have shown that they can change based off of the perception of those around them, especially Lesser Spren. You can even begin to tame them and they'll start developing a more individualized appearance. 

So, if a Listener bonded a Spren that had been warped by perception, could this change the Listener's form? If the Listener had training, could they alter a Spren they've already bonded to get a Returned-ish kind of shape-shifting?

Also, what do we think it would take for a Hemalurgic spike to be skewed by perception? They're already containing bits of functional Spiritweb, though not really alive. Maybe they could act a bit like Spren and respond to perception if they were Awakened a bit?

[Xanpheon]

I suppose the question becomes, "How much of a Listener Form is determined by Identity, how much by Intent, and how much by Connection?"

Bear in mind, in a very similar way to how you need to know what is in an unsealed metalmind to be able to use it - Intent - the Listeners were not able to bond a spren to achieve a specific form unless they rediscovered it through the songs (like Nimble and Warform), or if they were told about it (Stormform, Regals). Now, part of this is simply knowing what type of spren to capture, yes, but I think that simply modifying the cognitive aspect of a spren is not enough to affect the Intent of the form.

We also know that the appearance of Listeners, while they do change significantly between forms, have similar markers across all their versions. Rlain, for example, had the same patterns across being in Dullform and in Warform. So I doubt that changing the spren would affect the form of the body in a way that would actually make a difference to their appearance.

As for a Hemalurgic spike... I mean, we know that they aren't a perfect seal. The soul decays. But what kind of cognitive aspect do they have? They aren't like the Spren are, which are primarily Cognitive with a small presence in the Physical. They're nearly entirely physical and spiritual, and they contain enough investiture to make them harder to act on with Allomancy than non-invested metals. I think you'd need to give them some form of "soul" via awakening, as you suggest, for that to work - and that would be it's own challenge.