A little detail which I think wasn't often discussed is Sammael's zara board, which he found in a stasis box. Graendal notices the game in LoC, ch.23, when she visits Sammael:
"His smile pulled at that awful scar across his face as he beamed around the chamber, with especial fondness for the zara board projecting its field of still-transparent boxes in the air; he had always liked the more violent games. Of Course, a zara board meant his stasis box had been filled by someone who followed the Great Lord; possession of a single once-human playing piece had meant imprisonment at the least on the other side."

In a letter to Carolyn Fusinato (which can be found in the WoT Wikipedia) RJ elaborated on zara:
"The piece in the game could be said to still be human - those pieces that came from humans, anyway; there were other sources too - though they are about the size of moderately large chess-pieces. They retain memories, souls, personalities, but they are part of the game now, permanently slaved to the game and part of it as surely as a cog in a clock is part of the clock. They have no personal volition, though they do have awareness. The only lives they can [can is underlines] live are being used in the game. In the Age of Legends, these games were destroyed when found; the choice for the pieces was to remain part of the game or death, since removing them from the board\field meant death in any case. The game is all one, board and playing pieces together. And that is much as I will tell you of it. I don't want to give away what I might use later on, after all."

This is quite interesting in my view. One wonders how the humans or the "other sources" (whatever those are, Ogier for example?) can be such closely linked to the game and become pieces, never to removed again without death? Probably it's somehow done with the OP or the TP, or the board might be a special ter'angreal. It reminds a bit of mindtrapping and maybe also a vacuole (apparently the pieces don't die of age, for example), maybe the technique of creating a Myrddraal sword by putting a human soul into it or the Eelfinn's power to implant memories.

Finally, I wonder what RJ had in mind when he told that he doesn't want to give away too much since he might use it later? Might RJ have considered that someone on the Shadow-side tries to imprison humans in a way similar to the zara game?

In any case, if it's possible to completely force a former human's memories, his personality and soul into a game piece that has a certain awareness, I believe one can argue that this makes it even more likely that also the Wheel could preserve LTT's original memories and personality in TAR to eventually link him to Rand's personality basically as a kind of guide, especially since both share the same soul.