📚marathon-lore-discussion

[silk whale]

Gonna change my screen name to Pfhrogblaster

[hallow stag]

Why do the crew members in Marathon 1 try to save the aliens from my bullets?

[tranquil basin]

Exactly my question

They are so good in fact that every single one of them laid down their lives for the pfhor invaders

Wild

Some even gave their lives trying to protect the wall I was definitely aiming at

[hallow stag]

Maybe they're shape shifting aliens

I will kill everything that moves from now on, you can never be too cautious

[tranquil basin]

Exactly

[tranquil basin]

I mean who goes around saying “THEYRE EVERYWHERE” anyway? Sounds like alien shit to me

[junior condor]

“Oh good, its you!”

[tranquil basin]

Ok lore question idk if there’s an answer: is the blue pink shit this dude explodes into bc of the anomaly, or is it just a creative liberty to make the cinematic not gory like making blood sparkly in fist of the north star

I figure it’s anomalous but it’d be funny if they just said “oh ok we can’t make it blood? Fuck it, make it blue”

[silk whale]

Maybe as part of the molecular deconstruction or whatever is happening, the blood is de-oxygenated or otherwise altered and that's why it appears blue? 🤔

[tranquil basin]

Maybe, tho there is oxygen in tau ceti’s atmosphere but ig with an anomaly anything could happen

[hallow stag]

How many aliens enemies are confirmed to be in the new Marathon? Just the compiler from the 7th Cryo archive?

[tranquil basin]

From the ogs, yeah just compilers from cryo. There are ticks (unrelated to the ticks from the ogs)

I hope they add some more, but first and foremost I hope they make the compilers scary as hell

Bc I assume runner shells are nowhere near as strong as the battleroids so they could make fighting them way harder

[silk whale]

Hey now, we don't know that the ticks are entirely unrelated... Do we?

[tranquil basin]

I mean we don’t necessarily but I’m pretty sure ticks from the ogs only appeared on Lhowon, and they were brown and they flew. These ones are native to tau ceti and they don’t fly, and they’re part machine

I mean it could be something but I highly doubt it

[silk whale]

Those were "wasps." There was an exploding enemy in M1 called a "looker" or "lurker" that kinda looks like the ticks of M'26 ...🤔

https://marathongame.fandom.com/wiki/Looker

[tawdry lark]

They really need more toilets on this ship™
I poop mysel.

-# This message was sent from a CyberAcme™ Terminal.
-# ↀ Get yours today // Access • Update Terminal

[placid breach]

They could have escaped a bio-research lab maybe

[tranquil basin]

Yeah I’m wondering if they had whatever anomalous contagion in them and maybe they went and merged with some tech bc the contagion affects tech too

[tranquil basin]

Oh no I’m talking about these: https://marathongame.fandom.com/wiki/Tick

[hasty berry]

Blood isnt red cuz of oxygen

But cuz of iron rich hemoglobin

And iron is red

Granted deoxygenated blood has a tint of purple/blue ish

[silk whale]

Ohhh yeeeeah

[silk whale]

So maybe the atomization / deconstruction separated the iron & hemoglobin 🤷🏼‍♀️

[hallow stag]

Levels like "Colony ship for sale, cheap" should be against the Geneva Convention or something

Ok reached the "escape will make me God", pretty cool

I guess Marathon was an inspiration for Dying Suns

[tranquil basin]

See but that has such a funny terminal in it

[lethal gazelle]

I'm curious to see if the bots on a given map will ever be Pfhor instead of uesc and if that will mean that rook will get an upgrade to pass as a member of the Pfhor

Or maybe Pfhor will only ever be in raids

[tranquil basin]

I figure if they get added it’ll be exclusive to a map like cryo

[lethal gazelle]

Hear me out, spht/flickta scav that does a Pfhor salute to blend in

[winter sundial]

they should be on other maps on the marathon ship

[tranquil basin]

I assume there will be, it is huge

[winter sundial]

that are harder than cryo

and only containing the pfhor

no uesc

[tranquil basin]

Maybe even an equanimity map

[winter sundial]

cos they're too scared to go there

[winter sundial]

yh this would mean all uesc

[tranquil basin]

Unless the pfhor got to it first

Ripped it apart

And use it as a fob around tau ceti idk

[feral tapir]

Hidden map for after CryoVault. It is just a remake of "Colony Ship for Sale, Cheap".

[tranquil basin]

It’d be fun to find that terminal in there too

[feral tapir]

Though if we don't get a "Frog Blast the Vent Core!" reference somewhere, I will be disappointed.

[silk whale]

A raid-like scenario with a hunter or juggernaut that's so powerful it takes multiple runner teams cooperating to take it out...

... But will the teams immediately fight over the spoils? 👀

[feral tapir]

Punch someone into the lava - lament as you cannot loot their stuff.

[silk whale]

That would be bruuuutal

[feral tapir]

Which makes it all the more likely that it will happen.

[silk whale]

Good loot on the other side of this extremely narrow walkway over the lava... 😆

[feral tapir]

I would also be amused if there is a reference to the old Marathon PVP map 5D Space.

https://marathongame.fandom.com/wiki/5-D_Space_(Level)

[lethal gazelle]

Forgive my 10 days late response. The only one I'm not familiar with that you listed is Bastion. Can you elaborate?

[quick thistle]

I only have it noted down as a colony ai. It might have been one of the ones heard in a past YouTube short...

[lethal gazelle]

Hmm maybe I need to comb through again. Thanks for the reply pallo 😌

[visual lynx]

Give me a D.
— Durandal, Neither High nor Low, Terminal 1

[dark carbon]

Anyone know where to get lore on all the different factions. I’m still unsure of their background info and which I wanna choose

[wet temple]

Traxus is a megacorporation featured in the first game that had a rampant ai named after it that did some pretty bad shit, easily the most powerful faction in lore probably

Arachne we know very little about but they seem to be like a death cult

NuCal is basically McDdonald's/Ubereats but sci-fi

Sekiguchi Genetics is like a transhumanist pharmaceutical and prosthetic corporation, also equatable to life insurance companies imo, they also are responsible for creating the shells your runner inhabits/you play as

MIDA is basically a group of decentralized anarchists, also featured from the first game, the main thing they wanted was independence on Mars and for the corpos and UESC to leave them alone

CyberAcme is the last faction featured from the old games, they're a software/robotics corp that basically has a monopoly on all tech in the Marathon universe

thats how I'd sum them up

[dark carbon]

Thank you 🫡

[wet temple]

you dont have to choose only one when you start playing tho

you do contracts from all of them as you see fit

one at a time tho

and you get reputation for each based on what ones you choose

different shop unlocks

skill trees

each of the factions have slightly different focuses when it comes to gameplay too

I dont know as much there tho

Ive heard CyAc is like the "beginner" faction and then Traxus has the late game gear and high end weapons, while Arachne gives PvP buffs

not sure about their shop

[dark carbon]

So I’m able to do a CyAc bounty then a Traxus bounty after, for example

[tiny pebble]

mida 👍

[vital hollow]

nucal is Chiquita Banana/Dole Foods

[wet temple]

better comparison really yeah

[random fern]

So when it comes to shells and runner consciousness, do the runners have said consciousness copied and inserted into the shell, like arasaka’s soul killer in a sense, or is their consciousness actually being transferred to their shells?

[placid breach]

I think it's the second one, Like consciousnesses are transferred to the shell, then retracted during exfil/death, but they leave a little piece of themselves behind, so that's why they do the grounding exercises like the one shown in the cinematic reveal

[random fern]

Thanks

[placid breach]

You're welcome!

[supple lake]

Dead orbit making an appearance?

[dim adder]

Hello, original Halo fan, can't wait to play Marathon. I wonder if the employees are going to have some super cook exclusive armor like back in the Halo days.

[ebon trench]

found a bungie intern hired 2 days ago on an alt account^

[vital hollow]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SNyvTlynTI

I need UESC RECON or I'll DIE~

[tame jasper]

whats the lore

[visual lynx]

super-tldr: exoplanetary colony dropped out of contact. space government, megacorporations, and other interest groups rushing there to find out what happened and loot the corpses. you're a mind-uploaded mercenary doing jobs for them all via disposable artificial bodies.

[tame jasper]

underrated game

idk why everyone hating

[broken zinc]

Honestly I dont see a lot of hate anymore.

[tame jasper]

stories fire, the art direction and visualizations, the promos, and cinematics... its peak.

[broken zinc]

Most people have turned around pretty quickly to marathon, since the game got all the kinks ironed out and all the makeup applied

There was a lot of hate post alpha and with the art situation... Now (un)fortunately the most vocal haters of Marathon i see come from d2 players

[desert swan]

They've done everything they should've, proper alphas and betas, delayed the game when it wasn't ready, everything is polished. It's looking good

[broken zinc]

Or bungie haters, a lot of which used to be destiny players

[tame jasper]

ts finna blow up

[broken zinc]

(i say unfortunately because as someone who used to play destiny 2, a lot of their hurt comes from many places and takes many forms, and they believe marathon is stealing resources from their game to make this one, and thus are, in my perspective, taking their aggression out on an undeserving party - the devs of Marathon and Marathon itself)

It honestly kinda hurts to see lol. D2 players feel abandoned because Marathon is dropping and it's all hands on deck for that release, while their stuff gets delayed

They have yet to see or believe that marathon doing well as a game is good for d2 as well.

[feral tapir]

So, another piece of random speculation, but I do entirely plan on simply not extracting at least once after every major update.

Especially in CryoVault. If I can ever get to the last Vault.

Simply put, if I were designing content for Marathon, I would put an easter egg or secret into the game at some point that only appears AFTER the count down ends, and you have no chance of extracting with your loot.

As the lore implication of a Shell after the signal is lost intrigues me.

Presumably, the extraction beam teleports (or disintegrates) the Shell when you exfil.

[broken zinc]

I would just want to see what happens, or how long people can hold out. When in the alpha, i had one match where i was able to stay in overtime and it gets very rough very quickly, especially alone

[feral tapir]

So, what happens to the Shell of connection is lost?

Law of large numbers means I probably won't be the first person to do that, but someone WILL be the first.

[feral tapir]

Just, lots of UESC?

Or is there "artifacting" implying signal interference or loss?

[broken zinc]

I had this idea a while ago that there must be some sort of failsafe that happens if exfil isn't achieved but the shell doesn't die. Because theoretically, the runner could just.... Run. Like, run away. From the contracts, from uesc. And they would "be free" as long as they could survive.

I think the biggest issue though is that a runner would have to be able to disconnect Oni before being able to achieve anything substantial. As long as oni is there and still connected, then she would be able to track a runner. But the idea is that a rogue runner is technically possible... And what would that look like?

[rotund stump]

your mind gets yanked out on forced recall when you don't extract in the recall window (I would assume)

[broken zinc]

Mechanically, you get uesc swarmed with greater and greater force until you die

But I haven't been around long enough post exfil time to know

[rotund stump]

either you're left to die or oni yanks you out of tciv and into a new body

[broken zinc]

It'll be interesting to see what changes post game launch but essentially the game will highly discourage you from staying over 20 minutes

[rotund stump]

I doubt the corps would allow a runner to get captured and blow the whistle on them lol

if the UESC captures runners at all

[broken zinc]

Oni yanking someone out of of the body does seem plausible

If they're still connected to her

[feral tapir]

But the Shells have a rudimentary consciousness - they have voice lines, and all that.

[rotund stump]

they would as long as they're alive so yeah

[broken zinc]

There's gotta be a million contingencies in place to make sure runners can't sever that connection and break for it

[feral tapir]

I will be keeping an ear out for anything that sounds like ONI getting garbled.

[broken zinc]

I think in the alpha there was some.... Ominous voice lines on the comms at times? But I don't personally know for sure if those lines were from oni or someone else hacking into the line

[feral tapir]

Or a place in the CryoVault where "signal loss" happens.

If we get a lore tidbit noting that Shells are given a "self-destruct" order on the signal to your Runner getting severed, then I would be especially looking for any area which might imply a Faraday cage or the like.

[rotund stump]

the signal loss is from frost buildup if you're talking about the no signal screen flash thingy from the consumables short lol

[feral tapir]

Again, just all idle speculation at this point.

That would be interesting - freeze yourself solid to avoid the "end timer" kill in CryoVault to unlock some secret Lore bit. Bungie would have to make it accessible and repeatable, if it were an easter egg.

[rotund stump]

not too sure about freezing a synthetic body with a pile of electronics in cryo tbh

whether the mind inside dies or triggers some kinda recall in extreme near-death conditions

[scenic wasp]

i just joined the hype only recently. Do we know what role Durandal is playing in this games story at all?

[sinful hamlet]

Not yet but we do know that he has a VA for this game !

[scenic wasp]

Ben Starr correct? He was reading out Ozymandias?

[keen juniper]

He was credited but wasn't confirmed to be the voice actor for Durandal

[lethal gazelle]

It is most assuredly ben

[proven dagger]

I just got timed out for an hour for trying to bring up a certain US politician who is canon to the lore of Pathways into Darkness. Ugh.

[proven dagger]

[A certain politician name who I can’t say apparently] is told by aliens to nuke an eldritch god under a pyramid in the Yucatán peninsula.

Cill Blinton

[lethal gazelle]

You shrimply said his name and were muted?

[proven dagger]

Yep

[lethal gazelle]

Damn

[green plume]

How do the workingactors die to nukes but can live on the surface of a sun?

[lethal gazelle]

It didn't die

Was just incapacitated til jjaro came and properly took it away

[green plume]

Ah

[visual lynx]

wow, I noticed they had that kind of filter on the current president but I didn’t think they went back that far

[proven dagger]

Probably goes for anyone in current political discourse, especially related to a certain set of documents about a certain guy and his island…

[pliant cargo]

Guys where looking for informations about lore?

[rotund stump]

us

and a couple other sites in this channel's pins

[pliant cargo]

ok, and you guys gather the infos from closed beta tests?

I see that two pages thanks

[rotund stump]

old trilogy lore's documented by bungie themselves and karnemir's site has ARG lore, for tldrs you can come to us with mostly reliable accuracy

[pliant cargo]

Thank you!

[tranquil basin]

Hidden Xperia has good lore videos for the originals. JaketheAlright has good lore for both those and the new one

[pliant cargo]

Big thanks!

[unique flax]

I need to play more hell divers

Been playing to much fallout

[visual lynx]

TCIV should be covered in these flowers. would be hilarious. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achillea_millefolium

[solar nova]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yu7uN6-lNhk

Check this video, the editing is amazing too

[pliant cargo]

thanks

[tardy meteor]

just call him Bubba

automod doesn’t know ball with that one

[visual lynx]

ball is life 🐶 🎾

[ember narwhal]

Jimmy Carter

Sorry I had to see how far back it went lol

[eternal knoll]

fired up a wee bit of steam's version of classic marathon 2... was surprised to hear the pfhor going hom hom nym nym

did they not have the scritchy-scratchy voices instead in m2?

[visual lynx]

nope, they honk more than screech in M2/Infinity

[plain quest]

Hey so what is cow?

Worm I get cat I get but cow I do not get

[strong perch]

id hope the pfhor have their own noises but similar to “wort wort wort”

like maybe the helmets theyll wear have some darth vader type noise

id prefer a lil death trooper action over wort and vader though

[solar nova]

pozole

[broken zinc]

Not me reading this and thinking about apollo the parrot instead of the flood

[eternal knoll]

suppose i flipped it in my mind 🧠

[tranquil basin]

WAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUGGGHHH

[next sparrow]

how do we feel about the theory that the traxus lion is traxus iv?

[lethal gazelle]

I feel like brand wise they wouldn't want a rampant ai as their mascot. I could see the lion being a later model/version like traxus ix etc. Also they have Vulcan so idk if the lion is anything more than a pretty visual

[next sparrow]

yeaaa that would make sense

would definitely be interesting if it were kept on the down low or something though

[simple rampart]

I wonder if gantry is an AI, considering how MIDA and mars got affected by Traxus IV, and Gantry seems pretty lively

And he's got an _in his name which the others don't have so maybe he's a more unstable ai?

[timber urchin]

No basis for this but maybe he's similar to us where he's left his own body behind (if he isn't just a regular AI like the rest)

[simple rampart]

Oooo I haven't thought of that

That would be cool

Or maybe he's more a mascot for MIDA as he uses "we" a lot

Maybe multiple people use gantry as a medium to talk though

[sage lark]

I was under the assumption all of the handlers or representatives are AI

[sage lark]

We as in the MIDA movement

id assume so

[simple rampart]

Yeee
Man they really did a great job with gantry

Can't wait to hear him talk more

[hallow stag]

How long is Marathon infinity compared to the first two? I don't trust the length of walkthroughs and similar

[tranquil basin]

I think they’re similar

[scenic path]

/dac

[rotund stump]

funny enough jon goff did leave a vulcan gif at some tweet asking what an AI executive would be like

if we factor in out-of-universe dev interaction and hinting that is

either vulcan's more than a liaison or is part of a bigger AI like what felwinter was to rasputin in D2

[rotund stump]

doubt a single underscore would indicate stability but considering what mars went through with trax IV I doubt their liaison would be an AI at all lol

same for arachne (maybe), can't exert violence on what doesn't have a body

[simple rampart]

Yeeee

[rotund stump]

our* liaison

viva la revolution

[simple rampart]

Hell yeah

[broken spruce]

has anyone looked over the little bit of cryo archive footage we have and lined it up with anything from the og marathon game

i feel like there was on section i saw that looked A LOT like that corridor you enter where u find the first compiler in the M1

[deft bone]

Saw some footage of gameplay and they had this center staircase that gave me flashbacks to marathon.

[broken spruce]

man. i REALLY hope we see a lot more of that when we go into it

not that we obv saw everything in marathon 1 but

would be sick af if a lot of the map line up exactly like m1 had it

[deft bone]

Yeah marathon was one of the first video games I ever experienced and has this place in my mind like a vague fleeting dream. I still remember those freaky floating caped men and the silver plasma pistol

[broken spruce]

real..

i didn’t even know it at the time, i’ve been a huge fan of d1 and d2 growing up bc my dad bought me the game growing up when i was around 12

turns out he bought me it because a decade or two prior HE played marathon

so now we are both both hyped for marathon and it’s been a really cool bonding experience lowkey but it’s really cool bc i keep talking about how cool a lot of the gameplay is and he’s talking about all the lore stuff he knew and how much he knows about it and stuff bc he knew alot about the og games lol

[lusty lake]

In the timeline of Nu Marathon, would Earth have received Leela's warning?

[deft bone]

That's sweet. Yeah my Dad was obsessed with apple and owned a MacIntosh back in the late 90s. We got marathon 2 and I used to play it everyday. Now the plot went completely over my head cause well I was probably like 5. I remember when halo came out and saw it was like the spirit sequel to marathon. Played the hell out of Halo on my old blue Mac.

[broken spruce]

helll yeah

[tranquil basin]

Yes. it said like 82y to get to earth (which is weird bc it’s a 12ly distance) so if it really did take 82y it would’ve arrived in 2876, and this game is in 2893

[lusty lake]

Hmmn. When does Project Goliath launch?

[tranquil basin]

The equanimity? I can’t remember but it’s the early 2800s

The numarathon canon says earth was actually in contact with the tau ceti colony until the pfhor attack, at which point they lost contact and realized something must’ve gone wrong

[lusty lake]

I muse on if they managed to intercept Leela's message, because they would launched before it reached Earth, presumably.

[tranquil basin]

Maybe. Though a signal sent out like that would probably travel radially, so they’d have to block light years of space to intercept it if they didn’t catch it really early

But also it’s sci fi so they could say they caught it and it was transmitted in whatever way

It also could’ve just dissipated over a 12ly journey and been less than legible bc they were just using a standard light speed message instead of whatever ftl comms they had

[prime rose]

we know that Earth received a distress signal from the Marathon. We do not know what the canon explanation is for Leela's misquote about the time it takes to send a lightspeed message to Earth. There are blanks that Bungie may or may not fill in here but we just don't know yet

One possibility I have considered is that perhaps Leela did not send her message directly to earth, but instead bounced it around the galaxy via relays (we know interstellar communication for the UESC relies heavily on neutrino modulating buoys deployed at 1 LY intervals, although the Marathon did not string buoys between TCIV and Earth)

this could have been an attempt to conceal Earth's location from the Pfhor

We also don't know how Runners made it to TCIV the same year as the UESC Equanimity

UESC did not possess FTL interstellar travel when Equanimity launched. It slowboats at a considerable fraction of lightspeed (this is another problem though - the stated speed ignores deceleration and acceleration suggesting either a mistake, or that UESC vessels can instantly accelerate or decelerate)

But we know that Runners are on TCIV the same year the Equanimity arrives

We know that Traxus develops some kind of FTL infrastructure between Sol and TCIV, but not how it works, or why its stated that its easier to send data than flesh

One possible explanation for runners reaching TCIV at the same time as the UESC despite leaving much later is that they may have been stored aboard a sublight vessel as digitized minds, which would then be able to accelerate and decelerate much faster than the Equanimity carrying flesh-and-blood crew

[lethal gazelle]

You seem like the person to ask about this- do we have any idea how the UESC 3D printing works? The kind we see in game where they materialize in an instant from that red light. Like where does the material come from for instance

[tranquil basin]

I figured they teleport bc they have matter transfer

[lethal gazelle]

Oh sheesh ok

So the red light is basically just a schematic that the matter transfer adheres to

[tranquil basin]

Well they decided to send runners in 2888, meaning they have to have ftl travel

[prime rose]

UESC has teleportation capabilities and we know teleportation is possible without a receiver plate after Durandal reverse engineers this capability by studying the aliens

[tranquil basin]

At that time I mean

[prime rose]

Although we do not yet know if interstellar teleportation is possible

[tranquil basin]

Where are these buoys mentioned?

[lethal gazelle]

Arg

[tranquil basin]

Oh thanks

[prime rose]

lemme find it for you

wrong message reply

[lethal gazelle]

6. Future-proofing communications to Tau Ceti. In order to ensure uninterrupted communications more securely with the Colony, we propose building a network of self-regulating signal-boosting relay satellites between Sol and Tau Ceti.

6_1. Proposed signal-boosting relay satellites. To be positioned at one light-year intervals.

Twelve self-regulating Communication relay satellites transmitting data via a gravitation wave/neutrino modulator purpose-built by manufacturer decided by bid.

[prime rose]

https://marathon.karnemir.com/marathon/intercepts/uesc/memoranda

[desert swan]

Durandal returned to earth with ftl which is how we're getting to tau ceti so quick I believe

[prime rose]

There's no indication that happened in this timeline

[tranquil basin]

I thought that didn’t happen in this timeline

Or at least we aren’t sure

[lusty lake]

Yes but didn't he return 10,000 years later.

[tranquil basin]

Thank you

[desert swan]

I mean we got there within a few years somehow

I don't see any other explanation

[tranquil basin]

I think we just assume they figured out ftl travel somehow

[prime rose]

UESC does NOT know about the alien threat when they dispatch Equanimity and does NOT have FTL when they do this

They do not discover the alien threat until they arrive at TCIV and then they do not immediately have the means to identify it

ARG tells us Traxus developed FTL infrastructure between Sol and TCIV at some point but does not elaborate any further on this

[tranquil basin]

He could’ve returned but I figure they’d know way more about what happened on tau ceti if Durandal came back

[lusty lake]

One can presume Leela's datapacket contained blueprints for FTL or something.

[desert swan]

In the ending to 2 in the first timeline that was said

[tranquil basin]

I don’t think Leela knew how to ftl either

[prime rose]

ARG also tells us Traxus has departments for Interdimensional Diplomacy and science - its possible traxus figured out some kind of warp drive or something but we don't have any details here

[desert swan]

But it was doomed in infinity

[prime rose]

we also don't know why the Marathon distress signal did not include details about the alien threat

[desert swan]

I believe only durandal and maybe tycho would know

[lethal gazelle]

It would be crazy if Traxus was already making deals with the Pfhor

[desert swan]

It did, weren't the public freaking out

[prime rose]

no, the UESC tried to cover it up initially and the dispatched Equanimity operating under the primary assumption that the cause of lost contact with the colony was the result of a MIDA or MIDA-affiliated insurrection

"Aliens" didn't even figure into their possible failure mode considerations for the colony

[tranquil basin]

Also this says they were deploying the buoys with the equanimity, so Leela’s message was sent without knowledge of the buoys, and they probably wouldn’t have been fully deployed for decades after the light speed message would’ve actually arrived 12 years later, so I think they just have to retcon the 82y message

Or that timeframe

[prime rose]

When news breaks publicly about the colony, UESC makes very public that they are sending Equanimity because they want to be the hegemons of space and it is important they show Sol and their various post orbital allies in the asteroid belt that UESC protects its colonies

[lusty lake]

I could believe Durandal injected something into the datapacket. He basically "let" Leela use you after briefly kidnapping the security officer, no?

[prime rose]

I think its a possibility they could have used or launched sublight buoys elsewhere but its entirely speculation - but yeah the 'thon didn't string buoys to sol

[lusty lake]

Lots of interesting narrative space to work with.

[tranquil basin]

Yeah. One of the videos implied there were probes sent to tau ceti before the marathon was launched, maybe those deployed some kind of comms network

[prime rose]

Equanimity is selected for the relief mission because it is the fastest available ship to the UESC at the time, which depending on if you take bungie's speed value, or apply actual math, can do anywhere from .25C to .50C speed using catalyzed antimatter engines (fun fact, this is loosely based on actual science!)

[desert swan]

How long would that take

[lusty lake]

God I love hard sci fi. I missed this stuff.

[tranquil basin]

Maybe, tho with traditional physics it’d be pretty hard to alter a lightpseed message that’s already been launched just going through space, he’d have to catch directly up to the wavefront and shoot an additional wave with it to muddle it. But then again it’s scifi so I’m sure they could come up with some excuse

[desert swan]

Pretty sure he means tamper with it during transmission

[lusty lake]

When I say hijack I mean it's possible he had more control over Leela than Leela was probably aware of, probably just attached some encrypted files.

[prime rose]

we are told it takes them 97 years to reach TCIV from Sol

[tranquil basin]

12 light years, so whatever fraction of light speed times 12

[prime rose]

(remember, they can't maintain a constant speed - the ship has to speed up, and at the halfway point, it has to flip around and slow down)

[tranquil basin]

Oh oh I see

[lusty lake]

Like he literally just yoinks the security officer without Leela knowing.

[tranquil basin]

Well that’s assuming the acceleration ramps up for the whole half of the journey

They could just accelerate for a bit, cruise, and then decelerate

We’d need to know more about their actual propulsion and whatnot to determine how long they went at what speed

[prime rose]

We're given a sustained speed of .122C for the equanimity but this doesn't work unless they're doing a 50/50 accel/decel

[lethal gazelle]

I miss outer wilds

[tranquil basin]

Oh are we given that in the arg

[prime rose]

and actually hitting a peak speed of .244C at the midpoint

[prime rose]

https://marathon.karnemir.com/marathon/intercepts/uesc/letters you can scroll down here for the stats and manifest for Equanimity

(Kingfisher-class Salvage and Rescue craft)


Commanding Officer: Captain Ningal T. Enki

Ship AI: Virgil v21.0165 [Nrw]


LOA: 160.2 m (525.6 ft)

LBP: 140.4 m (260.6 ft)

Beam: 36 m (118.2 ft)

Height: 39.3 m (129 ft)

Displacement, Full Load: 41,528 mt (40,872 LT) Speed, sustained: 0.122c

Endurance: 150 years


Notes

2xHeikkiL3fusionCADdrivesw/Takala2.2symbioticpower- coupling generators for operational flexibility and redundancy [upgrade]

StanchionPullof2400ShortTonsforabove-thresholdtowingforce [upgrade]

Deckcranesizedandlocatedformaximummulti-missionflexibility [upgrade]

OffshipEmergencyResponsecapability [upgrade]

89m2EXFAB/ADDMANshop [upgrade]

5xHarpy-classALVs [standard-see att]```

[lusty lake]

Twenty-two minutes..

[lethal gazelle]

itspeak.gif

[prime rose]

it stands to reason that whatever FTL capability now exists, the UESC is using it to send additional ships to TCIV as well, unless the sec drones we fight are from the 240 stowed on Equanimity or produced by its manufacturing capability, or manufacturing capability salvaged from Marathon by Equanimity

[lethal gazelle]

Ningal T. Enki is the kind of name I make up when I need it to be an anagram for something else

[tranquil basin]

Well I think that implies average speed, not necessarily sustained speed

And linear acceleration

[prime rose]

Marathon itself had robust manufacturing capabilities, to the extent that even if they suffered total comms tower loss they should have been able to engineer a new one from local materials before Equanimity's arrival, so it's possible Equanimity could have salvaged some of that

its also possible I spend more time nitpicking this stuff than Bungie and they haven't actually considered all the finer points but who knows until we get our hands on it lmao

[tranquil basin]

True. They also had some issues in the ogs like lhowons distance to the galactic center vs its distance to tau ceti being impossible

[glossy garden]

do we know when this distress signal arrived at Sol? assuming the year is correct and not attempting to be blurred by the UESC/other factions

[prime rose]

iirc Sol receives the Marathon In Distress signal in 2886

the ARG suggests they don't immediately decrypt it, but that they do pretty quickly

It's not clear how many people in Sol pick up the signal and can decipher it beyond the UESC

but at some point, news about something happening at Tau Ceti gets out and that spurs the corporate gold rush

Traxus knows something is up fairly quickly, and the UESC offers them concessions regarding the OXYA PULSE industrial incident allowing Traxus and Sekiguchi to lead the media narrative there without interference in exchange for Traxus fucking off regarding TCIV, but Traxus of course does not care and gets involved anyway

They offer independent runner mercenaries access to SekGen S-series shells to work this angle

Runners take them up on it because ain't no other way they're going to get their hands on the fanciest new shells

MIDA also has spies in the UESC and the UESC itself is composed of multiple factions with different ideologies and goals, so lots of opportunities for leaks

oh I'm misremembering part of my timeline

Equanimity is not dispatched in response to the distress signal

Equanimity is sent due to lost contact in 2795

Distress signal arrives in 2886, spurring the gold rush

in the 100ish years between, Traxus and possibly MIDA know something is up at TCIV but not all the details

2472 - Marathon launches from Sol
2773 - Marathon arrives at TCIV
2787 - First colony on TCIV is established
2794 - Pfhor destroy the colony, Leela ostensibly sends a distress signal to earth
2795 - after extended lost contact with the colony exceeding any reasonable colony failure mode, UESC sends Equanimity relief mission to investigate
2886 - Marathon distress signal arrives at Sol system, triggering the goldrush
2888 - Equanimity arrives at TCIV. Observes unknown alien lifeforms on colony security systems. That same year, Equanimity records footage of Runners on the surface of TCIV.

The missing piece: at some point after 2795, before 2888, Sol humans develop interstellar FTL capability. In what form, or precisely when, we do not know.

[tired harbor]

Doesn’t durendal show his face back to earth some time around this too

[prime rose]

Old marathon references durandal returning to earth at some point to teach them how to make "warp capable fusion missiles" but it does not appear that happened in this timeline

namely, because the UESC has no idea there are aliens on TCIV until they get there

remember we were also told early on by Bungie that while the original games are canon to the new one, not everything that happens in them is true

to say nothing of M3 getting into crazy timeline shenanigans

[desert swan]

I think that mostly just refers to this continuing only the final timeline

[prime rose]

There is one other element we might relate to the delay in Leela's message

We know that there is some kind of temporal anomaly present on TCIV which can affect the rate at which time passes, or the rate at which objects or lifeforms experience the passage of time

We don't know the cause of this, except that it seems to predate the alien attacks on the colony

We don't know the scope or scale of it - perhaps its possible this phenomenon is not localized to one spot on TCIV, and impacted Leela's distress signal somehow

It's also possible the temporal anomaly had some kind of effect on the colony and ship AI, expediting their rampancy

[austere plover]

The time nonsense is really interesting to me. I really hope bungie goes all in on making a complete, logical story without too many lose ends or excuses for things not adding up which seems to happen a lot in stories like this

But I have faith

[hallow stag]

Done with Marathon 2 I liked it better overall, but some levels were still somewhat frustrating

No water levels in Marathon 3 I hope

[tranquil basin]

Hahhahahaa

HAHAHAHAHAHAH

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAGHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA

[tranquil basin]

Do we know they predated the pfhor attack?

[glossy garden]

this is like the entire marathon gambit though…

[blazing comet]

At least it’s not a maze

At least it’s not a maze

At least it’s not a maze

At least it’s not a maze

[gray sluice]

Could marathon infinity be a result of the same type of time anomaly as the security officer was on a jjaro station at the end of the game and since time flows linearly this could be a result of some jjaro technology?

[hallow stag]

Was the shift in aesthetic brought up in the lore?

In some early trailers or similar

[tranquil basin]

From old marathon to new?

[hallow stag]

Yes

[tranquil basin]

No I don’t think so

Just aesthetic change

there’s like callback stuff but the colors are primarily what’s been altered

[tranquil basin]

Wdym, the jjaro station was at the end of infinity

[hallow stag]

Marathon 3 has no missions directly on earth no?

[tranquil basin]

None of them do

So technically the stuff we see with the numarathon aesthetic isn’t overriding the old bc none of it was really featured in the old games

The only thing from the games itself that has had a direct aesthetic change would be the marathon ship itself, tho we haven’t seen much inside just the exterior

[hallow stag]

Yeah I was thinking that during the Marathon games visuals back on earth could've changed to any degree

In the new Marathon we come from Earth right?

[tranquil basin]

Yeah

[gray sluice]

What I meant by time flowing linearly is that while chronologically you're there at the end it could mean that it wouldn't matter as you'd be stuck in a loop ergo "you become destiny" because of the feasibility of a time paradox

[tranquil basin]

Also we never see the colony on tau ceti in the og games so they could have the aesthetic of numarathon too without it being considered a change

[gray sluice]

Or all the events of marathon infinity are happening all at once

[hallow stag]

I hope we will meet the tycho bootlegs in new Marathon

[gray sluice]

I'm really shit at explaining time travel

Jst watch back to the future bro🥀

[tranquil basin]

Good question

From explanations I’ve seen, people seem to imply it’s chronologically, u start from the beginning of one timeline, go until it fails, then rewind and repeat, until you find one that’s fine and then “select” it via whatever means the universe selects timelines (jjaro tech or whatever)

Though I think it’d also be valid to think of it in a quantum mechanics esque sense where all the timelines coexisted, and then selecting one collapsed them all and just one now exists

[tranquil basin]

This would also make sense bc Durandal-Thoth was guiding u even from the first one you visit

[gray sluice]

Time doesn't work chronologically though and we know this by how you play different levels at different stages of time. But also if an event happens in one stage of time that would affect all timelines then that event would happen

If that makes sense

[tranquil basin]

Yeah thus I think the coexistence one makes the most sense

And then they collapse

[gray sluice]

Sure failed timelines get chomped on by the W'rknacacnter so that maybe means the timelines get wiped out or converged or maybe the W'rknacacnter moves through timelines idk

Jst spamming time as a buzzword atp

[tranquil basin]

Yeah we just don’t know enough about how they function

But the thousand dreaming cats allegory seems to imply timeline 7 was specifically chosen to be the one to survive

Rather than the other ones dying via w’rkncacnter

[gray sluice]

Right so we know there's a 3 month wipe

That means something happens to this timeline

50% chance that I'm right ngl

[tranquil basin]

I mean that assumes the wipes reset all the story stuff

And are canon

It could be

[gray sluice]

Yeah but if they weren't in the story then why have short story arcs

Like the nucaloric one wouldn't last long after all it's just finding an infection

[tranquil basin]

I mean that’s just the part from the alpha

I assume it’s gonna evolve

[gray sluice]

Yeah but in this timeline what else would they be interested in

Unless the pfhor show up and they're like cool let's cut one open

[tranquil basin]

Finding out what the infection is, how it relates to the anomaly

And what the anomaly is

[gray sluice]

But that wouldn't take that long tbh

[tranquil basin]

And if they’re cosmically screwed or not

[gray sluice]

It's only one question

[tranquil basin]

It’s something they’ve never seen before and that wiped out a whole colony that can take a while

It’s not like u just touch the anomaly and go oh it’s this ok

[gray sluice]

I reckon the main attraction changes each season

Like cryo after season one won't be the center of attention

Maybe a new map

Or it rotates

[tranquil basin]

Especially if it’s jjaro tech or w’rkncacnter related, bc the people in universe don’t know anything about the pfhor or jjaro

And learning what’s in cryo or whatever will probably raise more questions than it answers

Etc

[gray sluice]

But on 4 maps you'd think they'd have to change a bit to add variety per season

Like they're not tarkov big

A new timeline would mean a lot of new content

Like idk going back to the original one and killing remnant pfhor

[tranquil basin]

I mean yeah but they could come up with other ways of changing stuff without resetting the timeline canonically

[gray sluice]

They did it pretty sparingly in infinity

[tranquil basin]

Also the other timelines like don’t exist anymore

[gray sluice]

They have an end

Not the whole timeline wiped out

[tranquil basin]

They don’t exist bc the 7th timeline was chosen to be reality

It’s not like a multiverse thing exactly

The w’rkncacnter being released wouldn’t end the timeline immediately

[gray sluice]

7th timeline was where the security officer interacted with a jjaro station then "became destiny"

Maybe he's running around forever in these realities

It's called infinity for a reason

[tranquil basin]

Yeah and the jjaro station made a singularity and contained the wrk

[gray sluice]

Doesn't mean that a lot more timelines aren't doomed to fail

[tranquil basin]

Plus the only reason the timelines split in the first place was bc the wrk breaks physics

[blazing comet]

Yall think that we might run into mjolnir recon 54 in some capacity?

[tranquil basin]

That also doesn’t mean they exist

[tranquil basin]

I doubt it (and I hope not) but I do think we could fight battleroids

[blazing comet]

Like some kind of elder thing come across?

[tranquil basin]

Bc they were gonna ship some out on the equanimity

[tranquil basin]

What?

[gray sluice]

If the wrk broke time that would mean it could influence any moment in time

Even if it only succeeded in one timeline

[blazing comet]

I figured that “becoming destiny” was like achieving Chim in the elder scrolls

Some kind of apotheosis

[tranquil basin]

That’s not necessarily true

[gray sluice]

Destiny does imply that he is the end of everything

[tranquil basin]

We don’t know about how far a wrk’s influence goes

Like maybe

[gray sluice]

I think that logic is pretty sound

[tranquil basin]

But there’s nothing saying that

[gray sluice]

Wrk comes along and splinters time

He exists in multiple timelines

Sure they're failed but like

[tranquil basin]

That doesn’t necessarily mean it influences things all across the universe’s lifespan

Otherwise the Wrks from the ancient past would be influencing the present too

[gray sluice]

Theyre trapped tho

Maybe that's why they're in a sun

And that's implying ( working on the basis) that the time travel tech isn't jjaro

[tranquil basin]

Wouldn’t matter bc if they’re not trapped in the past and they influence time all over then they’d still be affecting us but they aren’t

Thus they have limits on their time influence

[gray sluice]

Or the jjaro just trapped them with other time tech

[tranquil basin]

Ok

Well at this point it’s just extrapolating stuff we have absolutely no basis for

[gray sluice]

Apart from the jjaro time anomaly

And the game where you jump in time ends in a jjaro station

Which is also conveniently called infinity

And we are playing a game that wipes every 3 months for no apparent reason

With a time anomaly

[sage junco]

you guys saw the news article on Marathon server security and anti-cheat, right?

cheaters get imprisoned in dying stars

but there's an appeals process where you can bring your case for review to the Nar, who speak only in metaphor

[prime rose]

The Marathon survey teams/scientists encountered the anomaly before the aliens show up iirc

[green plume]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HO7Em_O-xAI

Anyone watch this lore video on factions by Neph?

[thorn finch]

Yeah its awesome

[green plume]

need more arachne lore.

[tranquil basin]

Oh I don’t remember this

[uncut mist]

Are these factions new?

[tranquil basin]

What do you mean

[north plank]

for nuMarathon? No

(as far as I'm aware)

[uncut mist]

For the Marathon lore. Are these faction for this game or do they have lore from previous games?

[green plume]

aren't arachne and sekaguchi new?

[north plank]

kindly fuck off

[north plank]

I know UESC/MIDA/CyAc are definitely not new; Traxus I'm not so sure

[green plume]

Pretty sure those 4 are all og

[prime rose]

Traxus and MIDA are prominent parts of old Marathon lore

CyberAcme exists but doesn't really get a lot of background

Arachne and Sekiguchi Genetics are new

[whole tree]

hey all, I have a lore question, not sure if this has a definite answer - do we know anything about where the Runners are? Like the shells are printed off and then teleported down to Tau Ceti but is the facility for all of that like in orbit? or is it on Earth? This may have changed but it seemed like it still took a long time for Leela's lightspeed distress signal to get back to Earth in Marathon 1, is Earth now capable of teleporting UESC and Runners to Tau Ceti at faster than lightspeed?

[uncut mist]

thanks

[lethal gazelle]

Also the two that feel the most durandalish to me

Arachne and sekgen I mean

[prime rose]

We don't know yet

They have FTL capability between Sol and Tau Ceti but we dont know what form it takes

We know that it is easier to move data at FTL between Sol and TCIV than flesh, but flesh is implied to be possible too

the cinematic short implies that runners' digital consciousness exists in a sort of server farm, perhaps in orbit over the planet.

UESC wouldn't just shoot down another ship in orbit - they are trying to nominally adhere to laws about espionage, corporate warfare etc at least outwardly and if it remains expensive and hard to move a ship to TCIV, starting a shooting fight in orbit is bad for business for everyone

plus Traxus nominally maintains the FTL infrastructure, so there is probably a degree of compromise going on between the diplomats

[remote magnet]

Plus, its possible in the faction profiling to get employed by UESC, so at least nominally they have runners of theyr own down there i think

[prime rose]

yeah it would make sense to me if more pragmatic UESC elements said screw it and started hiring mercs like everyone else

then they've got plausible deniability when someone does something super illegal

[lethal gazelle]

The idea of trying to complete a contract for uesc while uesc drones are attacking me is really funny to me

[prime rose]

it tracks though - if you look at the ARG stuff for the Project Goliath planning, there was a lot of disagreement about how to handle Tau Ceti

[lethal gazelle]

Nah ik just funny, that was one of my favorite bits to read

The point about mjolnirs scaring the hell out of the colonists was really smart

[prime rose]

you had groups that wanted to go in guns blazing, groups that wanted to take a more diplomatic approach, and then the actual winning plan, which was to send the biomata specialist teams that wouldn't look like military cyborgs to the colonists even if they were just as capable of mass destruction

yeah that

[wild swift]

Marathon

[remote magnet]

Wouldnt it be cool if they introduce UESC as an faction to do contracts for later on, but only inoficially?
Like, perks for running contracts for them could be things like generating less aggro from Drones. They TRY not to shoot you, but have to keep up apearances

[short hawk]

like, rook contracts

[remote magnet]

ye

[tranquil basin]

I assume sekiguchi sent a massive ship or something capable of manufacturing runners. In the cinematic reveal, Glitch said she had a big contract waiting for her “down there” referring to tau ceti, also I think one of the end shots implied they were orbiting tau ceti but I can’t remember

[tranquil basin]

I think that’d be cool, or from hidden people inside UESC who need something done off the books so you’re still hunted by them (I feel like that’d be the easiest way to do it without altering actual gameplay)

[subtle river]

Question: if all of our consciousnesses are digitized so that we can become runners, where are our consciousnesses actually stored? Is it on a database near Tau Ceti? What if something happens to that database? How did we even upload our consciousness in the first place?

[turbid nebula]

We do not know

[wet hull]

I really want to play this game, but there's no Turkish language support. Really?

[turbid nebula]

Good opportunity to practice English

Try starting by reading the channel name

[wet hull]

Thank you. I'm speaking from a translation device. That's why we need Turkish language support.

[lethal gazelle]

That would fit very well with the uesc and Traxus agreeing to be chill at home while fighting on tciv at the same time heh

[remote magnet]

I mean, the cinematic reveal shows that theres some f-ery afoot withRunners identities and memorys. Are we even sure we are human, and not AIs that have been told that they where human?

[subtle river]

That's an interesting angle, but nonetheless, we still need to be stored somewhere

[mystic cedar]

the null transmitter, what is that

[subtle river]

Also, that raises more questions, like if runners are just A.I.s, who created us? For what purpose? Why do our creators let us run around doing mercenary work on Tau Ceti? Is that all part of their plan?

[mystic cedar]

they said we just control the runner suit from far away like vr almost

but you get so lost in your runner identity you slowly scrub over and overwrite your own memory of your real life

[subtle river]

Yeah, I know that part. My question is that if we are controlling runner shells remotely, where are we controlling them from?

Where/what are we when we are not on Tau Ceti?

[mystic cedar]

earth

per the steam lore trailer i think

the 20 or so minute video on steam talks alot about it

[subtle river]

Yeah, but we don't have physical bodies anymore. That's what being a runner means. We all got our brains uploaded onto the internet

Also, it kinda breaks Canon to say that we can transmit our shells along with our gear across lightyears all the way from earth, near instantly

Especially when the UESC seemingly had to get somewhat near Tau Ceti in order to start deploying robots there

I could be wrong tho, someone please correct me if I am

[languid ruin]

idk i've seen bungie devs say runners "give up" their bodies like several times

so it doesn't make sense that we're piloting them remotely from earth

seems more like we play as digital clones made from a brain scan

[gentle kraken]

prolly need a relay, if there isn’t a ship there yet u can’t go

[subtle river]

Yeah, that's what I thought

My best guess, we're either being stored on a bunch of satellites orbiting Tau Ceti, or we're all on some data center attached to an astroid somewhere in the Tau Ceti system

Either way, it would have to be hidden so that the UESC doesn't find us.

[lavish palm]

real we need turkey gamers on marathon

turkish aim >>>

u shoud @ bungie

[visual lynx]

Karn challenged me on this once, but my recollection from the second ARG is that NuCal commissioned Traxus to send the mission to TCIV, and Seki provides the shells, that run CyAc software… presumably MIDA and Arachne are sleeper agents on board or something.

[tranquil basin]

That would make sense yeah, Traxus would definitely provide if they could get in on sekiguchi resources

[worn depot]

hi yall, quick question, do the anomalous events in tau ceti also affect the runners/bots aside from organic life?

[lethal gazelle]

The anomalies have been said to affect both organic lifeforms and ai yup

[worn depot]

do you happen to know how it affects AIs? Im not really tapped in sorry

[lethal gazelle]

I didn't catch that part but it seems to have multiple effects. There is a bit of time wonkiness with it, some gravity wonkiness, there is also the person's head exploding in the cinematic

The time bit would accelerate rampancy in an ai or a runner

Also if the anomaly is due to a wrkncacnter then it could bring dreams to life

Which might explain the youtube short where the security officer meets an entity that copies his words then presumably kills him

[quick lintel]

So uh, what do yall think runners do when not in a shell since some things hint that they might do stuff despite being virtual copies like paying off shell payments

[silk whale]

Probably some holodeck antics like Enterprise crew in TNG

[visual lynx]

you think they get to do other stuff besides work to pay off their continued access to existing to keep working?

[tranquil basin]

Ig wait for a contract

Maybe they have some things they can do for sanity’s sake

[silk bane]

And since there seems to be a cognition test before every run, it's almost like the corpos are also running an experiment in a controlled environment, so less chance of letting them do anything else but run?

[cunning sable]

I wanted to ask what arachne are (or, to put it another way, what do they represent)

[tranquil basin]

Death cult

That’s all we really know

[tranquil basin]

I’m sure it would be beneficial to study them in down time as well

Especially if they suspect rampancy is possible

Probably valuable data, especially considering they sell shells to regular consumers too

[silk bane]

That's a good point too

[lethal gazelle]

Keeping runner pilots confused with the photos and lucky charm stuff might be a way to prevent rampancy due to Strauss indicating that big personalities need to be recompiled on a shorter term basis

So less sense of self might prevent rampancy I mean

[visual lynx]

my own crazymurderboard speculation is that they're an ancient secret organization stemming back to protoindoeuropeans ("Aryans") with threads running through both the Thuggees and the … WW2 Germans … including Muller from PiD, who went looking for mystical powers in the Dreaming God's pyramid

[tranquil basin]

Maybe, though idk if it’s clear to the corps whether rampancy can happen or not

[tranquil basin]

Who is they

[lethal gazelle]

Arachne?

[tranquil basin]

Ohh

That is some crazy murder board speculation but that’d be cool

[lethal gazelle]

I love just how many Indiana Jones details are in this theory lmao

Also we have "Kali" in the game heh

molaram.gif

[green plume]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HO7Em_O-xAI&t=570s

Good bit about arachne here apparently

[visual lynx]

where do they get their info from?

they mispronounce Jjaro which makes me suspicious

[green plume]

ask them

[lethal gazelle]

Those drawings of the compiler and the kids with the uesc drone- if interpreted left to right, it could be that the compiler was loose in the facility (like in the cinematic) and killed those kids' parents before being captured and locked in the seventh vault aboard the marathon, then the kids were looked after by the uesc drone. Just an idea, we will obviously learn more

[prime rose]

chat gpt

bro's entire script is chatgpt

comments are full of people asking for days where he gets this info

he's just making it up unless he has super NDA'd leaks that weren't in the tech tests

[eternal knoll]

the script does sound kinda gpt-ish to be honest

[rotund stump]

"oh yk we just put a whole jar of that ro on the battleroids that one time and now they're wiping out a whole other alien race"

[strong perch]

do the droids have hearts? or is it just tech no idk fallout synth organs

[rotund stump]

roids are corpses in exosuits fitted with jjaro tech that us humans didn't understand at the time

[strong perch]

im mean uesc droids

[rotund stump]

likely just remote controlled bots

[green plume]

Those are runner shells.

[strong perch]

ok more like chappies then synths

[rotund stump]

doubt the UESC would expend valuable personnel to a place known to actively kill its inhabitants with expensive ftl travel and all that yeah

chappies if you will

[green plume]

https://x.com/meloneslada/status/2024991243684773942

^theyre uesc shells

[visual lynx]

battleroids are a pain in the ass

wait no that's a different -roids

[green plume]

Just like rook

[rotund stump]

we don't know yet

actually we don't even know how the rook injection process works judging by the footage we got

cuz it's dead rook shells lying around maps and I doubt sekgen would send us on a wild goose chase to end up in a prototype shell

if not sekgen then definitely some other org letting us have at it

[green plume]

The one uesc unit is very clearly using a destroyer shell with the shield.

And rook could just be a cheap training shell.

Hence lack of abilities compared to others.

[rotund stump]

potential difference being UESC personnel might get to keep their body

again

chappies

mind interface only requires a mind but since we relinquished our flesh we don't have a way back

whereas UESC grunts might

could also explain endless reinforcements

[eternal knoll]

would u mind spelling out for me what in this image seems to confirm that?

[rotund stump]

only hint I got was "for use by trained personnel" which confirms next to nothing 😭

[green plume]

The text

[eternal knoll]

o. yea i mean an autonomous drone armed with murder weapons would also say that

[rotund stump]

^

there's no telling what the training's for

remote control or interfacing etc

[green plume]

Yeah an npc running the same set up as a player shell just make sense that its not a shell.

Uesc would use shells as well. And have different options.

[rotund stump]

pistols are rifles then since both shoot bullets lol

[eternal knoll]

it'd make some story sense for them not to be piloted by runners, since they're being used to keep the lid on some classified stuff

and also i'd prefer it, because they will in fact be behaving like robots

[rotund stump]

and with compilers in the equation it's likely it assumed control over some part of the cryo archive enforcement there

and what happens to those minds per your shell mind interface theory?

[eternal knoll]

they just redeploy battlefield style in a new shell i suppose

it seems like we should be launching offensives on wherever the uesc are manufacturing these things. the equanimity?

somewhere in the TC system?

[rotund stump]

can't do that

[green plume]

Maybe one day

[rotund stump]

death wish + corpo-uesc treaty forbids it

's why we're here instead of official corpo forces

we're mercs for hire and not actual corpo employees

[eternal knoll]

i guess violating their quarantine and bashing up their security is some lesser violation...?

[green plume]

Well we're mercs

[rotund stump]

corps def don't wanna risk putting extra on a war they could prevent

they send us mercs there we're not actual employees and we can do whatever the corps tell us to do while the uesc can't do anything about it

[green plume]

Exactly

[rotund stump]

if they send official forces there then the forced engagements with the uesc would break treaty and it'd all go to shit lol

corps ain't aiming to get a hit back at the uesc they just want their cut from the expedition back

[amber goblet]

how did we get from aliens to a corporate dystopia

[rotund stump]

always been corpo dystopia and politics lol

strauss sneaked the 3 AIs in knowing they'd all go rampant halfway

especially durandal

[amber goblet]

the 1st game right

[rotund stump]

old trilogy as a whole yeah

[amber goblet]

i gotta play those lowkey

[green plume]

Well when youre trying to make it go rampant of course you know

[eternal knoll]

do it, or at least read the story page

[rotund stump]

it's really fun reading all that text too honestly lol

crazy aura compared to modern writing

[amber goblet]

should i play the games or just read through the story docs

[tranquil basin]

Play game, watch summary videos

[rotund stump]

if you're into retro experiences I suggest playing the trilogy

[amber goblet]

like is it worth it to play them or not really

[eternal knoll]

depends on whether you have a stomach for boomer shooters. they're fun if a lil mazey

[rotund stump]

it's some good old fun I mean

[tranquil basin]

They’re genuinely very fun, just a bit of an adjustment

[rotund stump]

but up to you yeah

[green plume]

You ever play old doom?

[rotund stump]

smth like old doom yeah

[amber goblet]

i did yeah

doom 1 and 2

[green plume]

Theyre likenthat

[rotund stump]

expect smth pretty similar

[amber goblet]

my main problem with older games like that is how difficult it can become navigating their later levels

[eternal knoll]

https://marathon.bungie.org/story/ start at 0. arrival and if you start to feel like you want to be playing this then do it. it's free

it does just make a great read. i'd suggest that before a summary video

[amber goblet]

bet

[hallow stag]

They're not that bad

I had the same fear but I managed to get through the first two easily enough

Some levels can be a bit more mazey but they're doable

[mossy locust]

Where can I learn more about these factions?

[muted trout]

the marathon story page [linked above] has some pages dedicated to the factions

[random fern]

Hey, can someone please remind me as to why Nucal adds numbers to every single one of their products?

[olive zodiac]

Stock and register

[nimble nest]

because its cool and big number goes up

classic corpo bullshit... just join mida

[weak bobcat]

What the hell did i do

Oh

I was being a liar

Yeah yeah yeah

Maybe visit therapy.com

[round solar]

hey guys whats the best video for marathon lore please?

[tranquil basin]

Bold of you to assume they’re soy or vegetable based just because they aren’t meat

[tranquil basin]

Old marathon lore I recommend hidden Xperias videos. New, go to Jake the alright

We prefer plastic in our burgers

Betrayal

I mean he betrayed u by pretending to tell the truth and then revealing it was lies

[turbid nebula]

soylent green isnt those things either...

[prime rose]

I don't know if it's clear from that label that those are piloted by selves. We know Equanimity is carrying 240 security drones, separate from its compliment of biomata shells, which indicates a clear distinction between the two

[split wind]

i thought they were just piloted like drones?

like theyre piloted by some guy at a computer or an ai

while shells need their runners

i think the reason to have that warning on the drone itself is to warn people from hacking into it in the field.

[prime rose]

I mean, at a basic level it's a lethal weapons system and part of the UESC/marathon aesthetic is big industrial labels and decals so i wouldn't read too far into it until we have more details

[split wind]

true

it would be cool if they were shells, but that just seems like a lot of resources….

cos shells would be harder to make than just… mechanical drones, yea?

i do think their movement and pathing implies theyre either piloted by ai or collectively piloted by some due

theyre too simple to be runners unless theyve been heavily restricted somehow…

[prime rose]

Sekiguchi produces a variety of shells of varying complexity and capability - we know they have different series like S series, A series, B series etc and that lower series' are lower spec and wider production ie B series industrial clones for mining use

Sekiguchi is also not the only producer of clone shells, cyborgs, robots etc, although all the shells Equanimity carries are SekGen models

SekGen's notable claim to fame over its competitors appears to be its neural sync technology that allows a self to be saved remotely at the moment of shell death

we also know Traxus, despite being SekGen's biggest client, wants SekGen's proprietary technology and more or less funds an entire biomata startup industry in hopes of being able to buy out or gobble up anyone or anything that might let them do what SekGen does without having to pay SekGen for it

[silver wigeon]

Anybody know where I can find detailed info on the factions that isn’t a video?

[prime rose]

there is not a ton of written documentation yet

If you want to check out the faction specific ARG stuff, Karnemir's archive is a good resource

https://marathon.karnemir.com/

Under the marathon tab on the left, the 'Intercepts' section has faction specific docs from the ARG

Most all of the non-arg stuff was under NDA until relatively recently

[cursive portal]

I heard that the founder of Arachne was a UESC member who saw a Runner die 15 times in an hour, which gives the idea that they are piloted, but probably not to the same extent as Shells.

[lavish saddle]

are runners battleroids? it seems like battleroids are implied to be way more capable than our runners are

[heavy nymph]

guys any idea on where u start to learn abt the lore

[cursive portal]

No.
Battleroids are cyborgs, shells are fully synthetic.

[cursive portal]

https://marathon.bungie.org/story/

[heavy nymph]

ty sir

[cursive portal]

Yw. Also try https://marathon.karnemir.com/.

[heavy nymph]

i just entered a discord server

[cursive portal]

Hm-
That shouldn't have happened...

[heavy nymph]

its called karnemir clade

[spare ruin]

Thats karnemirs discord for marathon

For me the site works as normal tho?

https://marathon.karnemir.com/marathon/contracts/cyberacme

[heavy nymph]

yeah nvm i just clicked on the link below that sent me to the discord mb

no idea who karnemir is tho

[terse vault]

https://tenor.com/view/friends-friends-tv-gif-gif-364624869047166705

[hallow stag]

I was thinking

Wouldn't the shells be extra vulnerable to compilers?

Due to the "computer elements"

[prime rose]

there's one guy on youtube claiming this without any evidence or source. I would not put any weight in that until he provides evidence.

his entire video sounds like he told chatgpt to write a script for a faction breakdown and it just made a bunch of stuff up.

[prime rose]

karnemir is a marathon community member who maintains the marathon.karnemir.com lore archive

[hallow stag]

How is that even possible? I still have to start playing

[prime rose]

its entirely possible for a runner to die 15 times in an hour, if they had 15 shells to spare

when Sekiguchi clone dies, their neural sync eject catch hardware jettisons the mind of the runner to whatever safe harbor, probably a server farm in orbit

this can then be synced to a new clone body

the arachne specific stuff librarian is referencing is unsourced from a single person on youtube, who is claiming to have lore details absolutely nobody else has

[hallow stag]

Runner(me) dies 15 times in an hour(they suck at the game) which isn't possible as I have never played Marathon

Wait, runners and shells are different things?

Like, runner is the "mind"

Shell is the body, no?

[prime rose]

a runner is just a term for a kind of mercenary who uses the shell

shell/biomata/clone are used interchangeably to refer to the bodies they inhabit

cyborgs are notably not shells/biomata/clones - they are a different technology made by grafting machines to existing human bodies, whereas the clones are built ground up out of a combination of biological and synthetic components

[hallow stag]

Cyborgs were first made during that asteroid war, I remember

[prime rose]

there are people who use shells who are not runners - for example Traxus employs industrial miners who use the Sekiguchi B-series clone line for labor

[hallow stag]

So is Rook some kind of lower quality shell lore wise?

[prime rose]

I think that's the idea - mass produced rather than a bespoke S-series piece that has been customized for the user and grown with samples of their own genetic material

or at least, not quite as bespoke. There is a broad range of these products from both SekGen and other vendors although I believe all the shells we occupy in game are Sekgen products

We also know you can produce clones and then save them for later - ie. the UESC Equanimity deploys to TCIV w a manifest listing a whole bunch of clone shells for its specialist teams, including spares because they expect a high attrition rate

[green plume]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gN5WtUdqPgA

A UESC "runner" dying a bunch of times is possible before we even get to tc4, why is there a childs drawing of a UESC dude and two kids frowning and also a drawing of a compiler killing people on tc4? Go to like 8:15 into the video to see it.

[eternal knoll]

rook has the look of a UESC bot, more metallic than the biomata shells... i wonder if they're something other than sekgen...?

[prime rose]

idk, it has a lot in common w the Destroyer model to me. Same kind of lines and shapes in a lot of places. It would make sense if they're just a cheaper model mass produced and bulk purchased by UESC

It's clear from the ARG that SekGen is everyone's first choice for shells

[eternal knoll]

destroyer is known to be a modified UESC frame, which, it's interesting how that mightve come to be as well... i guess sekgen and uesc have been parterned on these things

[prime rose]

also the Rooks have the same neural sync system the other shells do which is proprietary to SekGen

[prime rose]

SekGen is over 800 years old and the single foremost advanced manufacturer of synthetic bodies in Sol - Traxus is their top client followed by the UESC, so they do business with anyone who can pay

[eternal knoll]

i'm pondering the uesc equanimity's cargo manifest...

[green plume]

should queestion the marathons cargo manifest as well

[prime rose]

oKaY aRaChNe

(my own arachne theory is that it's some kind of literal cargo cult associated w the sleepers on the Marathon, and possibly one of the colony AIs tasked w sleeper preservation, because we see the cryopod motif show up in their imagery)

[green plume]

Seriously. Who logically sends a bunch of people 12 light years away with little to no security forces.

[prime rose]

to be fair they had a bunch of military cyborgs capable of destruction comparable to a small army

and the BOB security teams

[green plume]

10 for 30,000 people?

[prime rose]

at the time the Marathon launched, cyborgs were effectively weapons of mass destruction

[green plume]

and weren't those 10 a secret that Strauss brought along

[prime rose]

its a bit of meta narrative to explain why the player is able to solo an entire army, just like how the doom slayer fluff in doom got built up to explain why one man RIP TEAR KILLS the universe

[green plume]

It's the UESC marathon, why would the security of the people not be a top priority.

[hallow stag]

The 9 cyborgs down in the colony got eliminated by Tycho, right?

[eternal knoll]

on the equanimity we see around 500 items marked (SekGen), Bio/A-Types, Bio/B-Types, and BioMNGTs... i believe these are frames a bit less advanced than the ones we'll be using. are these the rooks? UESC-aligned shells for the specops and sigint people on board to use? seems like these could play a role in the story later on...

[prime rose]

The marathon had plenty of security forces - the literal first mission in M1 sees you roll out w a bunch of bob security forces and the ship security officer is a cyborg

[eternal knoll]

there's also "22kx ZGDS AVP PPG/5100kh", which i wonder if this isn't the complement of robotic troops.

[prime rose]

Unclear if they are rook model specifically, I think it is implied they are bringing a few different options

[prime rose]

I think that would be more likely to be this one:

§ 240x BHN SecDrones/3,120kg

[green plume]

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/TUhMQ7wwJiw/oar2.jpg?sqp=-oaymwEYCJUDENAFSFqQAgHyq4qpAwcIARUAAIhC&rs=AOn4CLAPhHf2mhgHJNiGpDQgSeP9Nbp1hg&usqp=CCk

Explain this picture, There were more UESC forces on there than we know.

[eternal knoll]

true. only 240 tho, lol?

it would be funny if the events of this game are implied to take place over much fewer battles than we'll be seeing as players, but it feels likely-ish

[green plume]

Also Tycho killing off those people is a we don't know thing. Infinity seems to leave a lot of in the air on what happened post m1.

[prime rose]

I don't think the UESC forces present on TCIV that we see in game represent the ones that arrived on the Equanimity but we can't say for sure.

We know there is some kind of FTL travel between Sol and TCIV by 2888. The UESC square ship we see in the game does not match the dimensions provided for the Equanimity either, which implies they've brought additional resources

[eternal knoll]

a usec bot being there in colonial times is very odd to me indeed

[prime rose]

possibly an oversight, a lot of that graffiti didn't show up in-game until after they had to scrub a bunch of environmental decal assets due to the antireal situation

[eternal knoll]

it would bode poorly for an oopsie like that to get a lingering shot in pre-release material, even if it is just a yt short...

let's hope it means something, and it's not something lame

[green plume]

That video I linked above talks about that one and a bunch of others that's pretty interesting

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/TUhMQ7wwJiw

actual short

[eternal knoll]

yah ive seen that jakethealright vid

[green plume]

yeah it even has the outpost map which isn't that supposed to be something dealing with the UESC?

[eternal knoll]

the cyborgs being smuggled in by strauss to resist the uesc's martial suppression is an interesting idea. but it sits as a bit of a clunky retcon, and seems to betray the setup of the uesc's force being present on tau ceti specifically in response to the singal and whatever secrets they're now trying to protect on the planet

the ARG does a little dramatization of the charter for the equanimity mission becoming gradually more militarized. are these bots really centuries-old tech by now? if they've really been active on the planet this whole time then the equanimity mission would seem weirdly absent in the story we've seen so far

so yeah that kid's drawing seems rly out of place. maybe they just had a teacher bot that looked like that ??

[tame ice]

What’s Rook’s background? Is it known?
Is it some kind of second-tier shell for people who can’t afford better?

[green plume]

I thought I saw something on the rook that it was made for the UESC but idk how true it is.

[eternal knoll]

it does bear the UESC logo, color scheme, and imo the same boxy look, so there's kind kind of link there that's a little more direct than enforcer's imo

[green plume]

IDK how all of them wouldn't be made for the UESC in the first place anyways

[modest sigil]

It's supposed to be a test model iirc

[prime rose]

UESC isn't the only government in Sol and isn't the only client buying military-grade hardware from SekGen

It's possible the rooks were produced for the UESC and ended up in merc hands

[tame ice]

Because ingame, Rook doesn’t earn you any XP, doesn’t let you progress your quests, or join any of the major corporations… Strange.

[modest sigil]

That's why its head isn't as detailed

[eternal knoll]

it seems it's traxus who put up the initial funds for the deployment of the high tech frames

[green plume]

Who are the other governments in Sol?

[prime rose]

Mars is nominally UESC but Traxus is the power player there. The Asteroid Belt has many polities in it living on rocks and stations. Some of them are part of the UESC and some of them are not

[green plume]

and why aren't they getting their hands in on this?! probs too broke.

[eternal knoll]

other corps like cyberacme and nucaloric also represent political powers since they have monopolies on fundamentals like computing and food

[prime rose]

Part of the reason the UESC is in a rush to get Equanimity to TCIV is to show all those asteroid belt governments that they take care of their colonies, and to show their colonies that they won't tolerate ghosting

[onyx prism]

so whats the lore of marathon? im a big bungie fan since d1. is the lore at all related to other bungie games or is marathon lore has it own story

[uneven pecan]

Oh my, where to start…

[onyx prism]

dm me

i want it ALL

[rotund stump]

well ig that puts aside all the speculation

uesc units are just rc droids

[rotund stump]

you're injected into a rook shell already present on the colony and it's likely not sekgen that does it for you

that part's up to speculation, mida shenanigans and all that

[rotund stump]

7 major factions, pick one

I can maybe try to summarize lol

then we'll head to the actual canon

[glossy garden]

I thought the equanimity became less militarized? at least based on the emails

they seem to think they’re going to enter a war at new cascadia but don’t want it to appear like anything more than an assistive effort, and so the memorandum drafts reduce things that could be perceived as aggressive

[uneven pecan]

I suggest you digest a plethora of lore videos on YouTube. Lore is just endless rabbit hole, you can decide how far you want to go.

[rotund stump]

I still gotta read up on equanimity I forgot it's a thing 😭

mucho texto

[tranquil basin]

Hidden Xperia videos for the first 3 games lore. JakeTheAlright for the Nu lore

[uneven pecan]

Emms movies for classic trilogy is also nice. But watching them all will already lead you spending 4.5 hours.

[ivory skiff]

Idk if its what you were looking for but Rook is a prototype UESC shell that was stolen according to the ingame description

[eternal knoll]

valid way to read it, to me it seemed like the ppl in the emails were resisting the “warhawks” but the charter drafts kept adding little hedges of bets that pointed in the direction of anticipated mida resistance

[tranquil basin]

Oh that’s cool

[eternal knoll]

nice, thanks :)

[rotund stump]

what mjolnir gen was the security officer?

was it IV?

[glossy garden]

in the first three games, Mark IV

[rotund stump]

they planned to drop mjolnir IXs on the second memorandum 😭

jfc

[glossy garden]

I knew that was exactly what you were gonna point out too 😭😭

[rotund stump]

actual overkill LOL

[glossy garden]

sure, and it could be the case but I think it’s demilitarized

original plan for PROGO was much larger in scale; more ships, more security operatives, etc., including Mjolnir Mark VII-IX cyborgs, but by the last draft its reduced to 1 ship, a “limited crew,” and clones instead of the cyborgs

obviously they’re aware of the anti-government forces, and that’s the whole reason they start with such a large armada, in addition to other possibilities, but they reduce it because they don’t want to alert people or cause panic or chaos

[rotund stump]

the most unrealistic part is somehow the UESC arguing against the nuke and pave option oh my god 💀

[glossy garden]

I’d argue that makes a little bit of sense actually

they probably don’t really know what would happen if they nuked the place, and they at the very least would like to recover or uncover something about whatever happened since they seem to be in the dark too, and that kinda goes against their prerogatives

there’s a little bit of internal and external conflict, other organizations that invested in the marathon want to launch and capitalize on the events at New Cascadia and so do some members of the UESC, whereas some in the UESC (and other factions like nucaloric?) do genuinely want to help and save whatever or whoever is left at the colony; nuking the colony would result in neither of these things happening

nuke colony = no one gets what they want/nothing is learned = panic amongst the civilians in the Sol system = everyone is upset

[rotund stump]

mem 1 was the final draft right?

judging by dates

draft A*

[glossy garden]

yeah Draft A is the final draft

Nov 2nd right

[rotund stump]

mhm

draft B had them sending mjolnir IXs and 2 days later they're debating it

final draft only had oguns and harpes

guess they had the command team ready too and only had to pick a ship

now I'm wondering if we can raid the equanimity in the future if it's big enough for it

[glossy garden]

there’s a lot of maps they could do with all this new lore which is really awesome

[rotund stump]

expecting some kitbashed sections of the ship for adaptation to whatever happened to tau ceti yeah

they dropped the whole mida tirade in the final draft too it seems

actually

would it be possible if the colony had a gaius copy?

"Ga" sounds like a possibility given the descriptors to personality

[visual lynx]

I think we know there's a Gabriel on the colony

a medical AI or some such?

[rotund stump]

oh wait yeah gabriel then nvm

wonder who's the chev class out of the 11 then

[visual lynx]

Joy(euse, of the same temper and steel as Cortana and Durandal)

[rotund stump]

I mean

I don't like to rely on bungieverse™ info much but

eh we'll see

[eternal knoll]

o was i readin it backwards? the shorter charter is the final one?

[rotund stump]

haven't gotten to every letter yet I only read the drafts lol

[lethal gazelle]

Joyeuse is stated in the arg to be chev class

[rotund stump]

on the second one from strauss rn

[visual lynx]

"chevalrie" refers to French knights like the Count Roland who wielded Durandal, and in that real-world literary universe / legendarium there are two other swords "forged of the same temper and steel", Cortana and Joyeuse. It's not just a Bungieverse/Halo thing, if you have an AI called Durandal who's "chevalrie" class and others of that same class then you should expect a Joyeuse to be among them. (You should also expect a Cortana but they're not gonna do that in this game for obvious reasons.)

[rotund stump]

fair enough

historical refs aside having it mentioned in the ARG's the best lead imo lol

[lethal gazelle]

In case any are interested
Du - Durandal
Le - Leela
Ty - Tycho
Ar - Arthur
Ba - ?
Da - Darius
Ga - Gabriel
Ic - Icarus
Jo - Joyeuse (Joy)
Li - ?
Na - ?

[rotund stump]

where did we get icarus's name?

[eternal knoll]

wat is a chev class?

[lethal gazelle]

Arg

[visual lynx]

Li and Na? Alkali Metals class of AIs confirmed?

[lethal gazelle]

Na gonna be real salty

[rotund stump]

seen arthur before from the first letter

wasn't sure if it's an ai

[eternal knoll]

trying to guess at the unknown names… barbara……..

barry …………….

[rotund stump]

barry allen...

[visual lynx]

maybe Ba is in the same group too

[lethal gazelle]

Someone here said bastion but when I asked for source they couldn't remember. Not saying it's wrong I just don't have confirmation

[visual lynx]

Barium

[rotund stump]

any myth names that start with Ba?

[eternal knoll]

there’s bast, egyptian cat goddess

or bastet

[lethal gazelle]

Balthazar

Uh

[rotund stump]

baldur

check the personalities too

[upbeat jackal]

"Joyeuse, Cortana, and Durandal" is real-world based (mythology, not Myth).

[tranquil basin]

Baal

Lilith

[lethal gazelle]

Bahamut

[rotund stump]

bahamut would be kinda funny ngl

[lethal gazelle]

Na clearly naked snake

[rotund stump]

real...

[lethal gazelle]

Li clearly ligma balls

Btw:
"Learn from the P.A.S.T.
P-Pressure check
A-Air supply
S-Suit up
T-Tell Gabriel (the New Cascadia Medical Health + Wellness AI)"

[eternal knoll]

lickitung and naclstack

[tranquil basin]

Batset

Balor

Nathaniel

Namtar

[lethal gazelle]

There is also a small poster of a baby biomata with the words "contact Gabriel to begin"

[tranquil basin]

Does anyone have that list of their personalities

[rotund stump]

I got like zero knowledge on arthur and icarus 😭

bot sure what their roles are

[lethal gazelle]

Now, a short note on each of the Project: Marathon AI~

Ship AI:
Du_0706419v4.96 – Goal-oriented; creative; focused. Underutilized; tends to brood. Need to find ways to distract. SCIENG crew to be kept informed, but I’ll keep an eye on this myself.

    Le_0413418v5.06 – Adaptable; detail-oriented. Second best candidate for colony oversight once mission enters second phase.

    Ty_2121418v5.06 – Proactive; assertive. Can be overbearing; monitor interactions with Durandal. Be sure to inform SCIENG crew

Colony AI:
Ar_1814419v4.93 – Benevolent autocrat; no-nonsense; problem solver. Classic patriarchal authority figure.

    Ba_0423419v4.89 – Problem solver; confident, bordering on boastful. May need to go onto accelerated re-compile cycle, inform SCIENG crew.

    Da_1907420v4.86 – Dutiful; diligent; motivated. Always puts others ahead of self. May need to address this at some point.

    Ga_2815420v4.81 – Compassionate; empathetic, transparent. Perhaps our greatest achievement to date. Will most likely need to be moved to an accelerated re-compile cycle at some point.

    Ic_1624420v4.73 – Motivated; assertive; proactive. Will need to keep isolated from Tycho or establish hierarchy at outset. Inform SCIENG of situation.

    Jo_0309421v4.69 – Resilient; optimistic; patient. Colony AI: defense, training

    Li_1817421v4.65 – Focused; assertive; good communicator. Designated candidate for colony oversite during second phase.

    Na_0602422v4.61 – Proactive; goal-oriented; committed. May need to be reminded from time to time about their primary function; inform SCIENG crew.

[rotund stump]

second letter by strauss on karn's site in the UESC section

yeah that

[tranquil basin]

Oh wow that was fast thanks

[lethal gazelle]

Got it on lock

It's my main fixation

[rotund stump]

you have the letters tab open rn don't you 💀

[lethal gazelle]

Nah I have it in a private chat for easy copy paste lol

[tranquil basin]

It’s a shame Tycho was such a turd was bc I like his namesake

[rotund stump]

😭 😭

[tranquil basin]

Big fan. Tycho Brahe had a pet moose he’d drink with, best buds. One day the moose fell down the stairs drunk and died 🙁

[gray sluice]

I'm gonna be in this marathon pfhor I become god at being a runner in the ceti but I might have to throw in the tau beIV I become a bit rampant and crash out like a Duran Duran dull fan because my earbuds are too loud and I've got to go to wrk after because the cat needs to eat, huh?

[tranquil basin]

Thousand cats

[lethal gazelle]

That's why meese can drink but not be above the ground floor

[rotund stump]

is it actually meese

[tranquil basin]

Ik it was sad. Wasn’t even his fault, he lent him to a friend for a party and the friend wasn’t v responsible

[rotund stump]

I hate english

[lethal gazelle]

Absolutely not 😌

[tranquil basin]

Sadly no

Just a joke bc geese

[rotund stump]

I was like

it's so fucking unserious if we actually call moose like that in plural LOL

[lethal gazelle]

We're pushing the friend down the stairs next

[tranquil basin]

Germanic words often aren’t plural with an s

Turns out the dumb exceptions to English grammar actually are rooted in rules

But we just adopt too many rules from languages of origin so it gets confusing

[visual lynx]

SPACE HAS A TERRIBLE POWER

[tranquil basin]

Mr chat suggested balisarde/balisarda bc it’s some other myth sword from Italy, not directly related

Probably a stretch

Lilith would make sense for Li but then again i feel like ur intentionally waiting for ur ai to become evil if you name it Lilith

[lethal gazelle]

Also with Tycho it has me wondering if the remaining ones are less legendary

[tranquil basin]

Na, Nathaniel would fit with Gabriel. Or Napoleon

[rotund stump]

turns you into fanta

[eternal knoll]

na’s characterization seems contradictory. goal oriented and committed but needs reminding about goals…

[rotund stump]

napoleon would be wild

[tranquil basin]

Bach

[rotund stump]

lived like so many centuries ago now it's gonna dominate a whole new planet

[lethal gazelle]

Idk yo I'm super goal-oriented about everything except what I'm supposed to be doing

[tranquil basin]

Basil

[tranquil basin]

And then get banished and clowned on for centuries abt being short

[eternal knoll]

hello, runner. my name is bangerbot

[tranquil basin]

Babbage sounds like a dumb name but it would fit thematically

[lethal gazelle]

Badbitch

[visual lynx]

sounds to me like they get fixated on things that might not be the thing they're supposed to be doing.

[eternal knoll]

baggins :)

[visual lynx]

what's baggins, precious?

[gray sluice]

Does the security officer have genitalia canonically since he could assimilate into the marathon crew

[rotund stump]

I

[lethal gazelle]

Probably

[tranquil basin]

What

[lethal gazelle]

But I doubt the beans are beaning

[tranquil basin]

ADHD af

[gray sluice]

So since there's infinite timelines there's one where he could of cracked a pfhor

[tranquil basin]

Banned

[lethal gazelle]

Maybe even split a spht

[gray sluice]

Jazzed on a jjaro

[tranquil basin]

Navarre

[lethal gazelle]

Worked his cac into a wrkncacnter

[tranquil basin]

Anyone up wrkin they cacnter

[gray sluice]

Dragged it on durandal

[unkempt portal]

anyone got a countdown till the release

[wise plank]

Count to 100 real slowly

[visual lynx]

here you go https://www.timeanddate.com/countdown/launch?iso=20260305T10&msg=Marathon&font=sanserif

coincidentally 8 days 19 hours and change away

hats off to 819

[unkempt portal]

thanks

[silk whale]

Always

[lone sedge]

god the rook cinematic is so great

for me it really shows me that this is really a goldrush

and your bound to have really unexperienced runners who cant afford the good shells just fumbling their way trough tau ceti in cheap disposeable trashcan shells

really good shit

makes it cooler to see the actual good runners styling around in their (probably pretty expensive) shells

also makes more sense why the factions would reach out to the actual runners and not the rooks

they are actual if not trained then experienced mercenaries and fighters

[wise plank]

Rooks are canonically broke bitches

[lusty lake]

How much validity is there to the theory that the entire universe is a cage for the W'rkcacnter? I've heard this once a while back and it stuck with me. Explains why the Jarro might be considered a single individual and not an entire race..

I guess considering the lack of knowledge it leaves a lot of theories open, I suppose.

[broken zinc]

The thing i am finding interesting currently with the cinematics is not just how they are choosing to release them, but a detail so far (3/3) is that Destroyer, who appeared alone and potentially going rampant in some fashion in its cinematic, is the only shell so far who has been in every cinematic.

Obviously it's to be seen if this trend will continue but i remember someone having a theory that durandal was watching the runners, maybe even in the runner bodies, and I can't help but wonder, if the destroyer shell, the one seemingly going rampant, the one where a robotic voice said "marathon" to us in the end credit... If durandal isn't hitching a ride, and the (lively) destroyer shell in each cinematic is a sign of him "watching" us or watching runners

[lone sedge]

its really weird how destroyer has been in every cinematic and is usually getting destroyed or is already

[broken zinc]

And yet is also alive or at least active

[cursive portal]

"It just feels like what it is, right? Like a trillion bucks."

[lone sedge]

also in every instance we see him he acts very

driven?

[broken zinc]

He's definitely playing dead in the rook cinematic

[lone sedge]

the other runners have alot of personality talk and act a bit but destroyer is always very focused on something

[lusty lake]

Rook fits so well in the narrative I wonder if they always had it planned from the start.

[broken zinc]

He tried to get one up on rook but the inexperienced rook just fear spammed the trigger

And i mean to be fair if I thought a body was dead and came back to life to grab me like a zombie i too would fear spam the button out of terror

[prime rose]

SekGen doesn't directly have a hand in every neural sync with its products - we can see from the ARG that companies like CYAC produce software/network components used for this process

CYAC's UDRIVE Version 51 for example boasts a neural drift rating of .002% which might make it more appealing than a competitor offering neural drift of .02% if you like retaining your memories

[prime rose]

it's demilitarized in that the ship itself is not capable of orbital bombardment (orbital bombardment is banned by treaty in Sol, so all the warships that can do it are mothballed)

the mission itself is 'demilitarized' in that they leave the cyborgs at home to avoid appearing like a military invasion force, and instead send a bunch of specops agents with clone shells

[cursive portal]

The universe as a whole is new to me. Would things like the temple in Pathways Into Darkness and the Sph't's sun just be like- Holes in the universe it could escape through?

[lone sedge]

deffenitely very goal driven even beyond loot or death
in the cinematic trailer he seemingly dies pretty randomly maybe thats not the first few times that happened and he just doesnt care about it since hes already used to it
maybe a very rich guy looking to get more artifacts?

[prime rose]

Think of the runner shell like your smartphone

Think of SekGen like the smartphone manufacturer

Think of CYAC like your wireless service provider

[lone sedge]

but thats all assuming it isnt just a running gag that destroyer dies AND that all the trailers are from the same runners running the same shells

[cursive portal]

Him dying to protect Blackbird and Void is an interesting choice then. Maybe his goal isn't all-consuming, as he's still very focused on cooperation.

I also don't think any one person has enough wealth to afford a shell.

The corps have to be behind you in some capacity, surely?

[lone sedge]

honestly to me it just looks like they sold him lol

[cursive portal]

They might've sold him, but he tried hard to protect them.

Running forwards to present a bigger profile and everything.

[lone sedge]

true true...

also no dialouge the only case of any emotional reaction was a pause before going into the tunnel in his cinematic trailer then a little hand movement of courage

so i dont think theres an ai behind him

also he had the first cinematic trailer for him

[lone sedge]

actually thinking more about this

now im probably talking crazy but

he saw the fire uesc bot

had the flashback of him burning

processed that and was able to block it

could be interpretadet as very ai like

but its a reach

[cursive portal]

I'd say so.

[shrewd flame]

what is the lore of this game

[broken zinc]

In a nutshell: AIs are better than us, and how