lore-and-universe

[crimson monolith]

And by making them immune to the rings

[modest marsh]

This was a contrivance so you could set up the Didact as a villain

[crimson monolith]

That makes them more threatening

[carmine sleet]

The Endless isn't the Flood

[crimson monolith]

Therefore overturnning the whole point of Halo

True

[dusk jetty]

Ancient humanity and forerunners were similar in many ways

[crimson monolith]

I'm not saying that

[carmine sleet]

And a species surviving Halo is not somehow a thing which ruins the entire story

[modest marsh]

Because the way Bungie left off Halo 3 very obviously paints some ambiguous forerunner threat as what we’re supposed to expect

[crimson monolith]

Kind does though

Nothing can survive that

[dusk jetty]

I for one personally prefer the original halo 2 ending that arbiter discovers that humans are forerunners and vice versa

[crimson monolith]

And I disagree with that story line

[dusk jetty]

The storyboarded one

But them being two different species isn’t that bad

[crimson monolith]

If only we got that version of Halo 2 lol

[vernal ingot]

I mean, spark says “you are forerunner” right to chief. And truth needs humans to activate the rings

[crimson monolith]

That is old bungie lore

[dusk jetty]

That would’ve been the end of halo so maybe not

[carmine sleet]

The Forerunners didn't know something could survive, they decided to imprison the entire species because they didn't want them messing up their plans for humanity. This doesn't ruin anything about the story of the entire series

[dusk jetty]

That storyboard basically has halo 3’s ending but the ark is under the crater in Mombasa

[crimson monolith]

It does because it uplifts the endless to the status of a bigger threat because they can just activate the rings and keep all species down and keep themselves on top

[dusk jetty]

So chiefs death is like even more uncertain then it was at the time

[crimson monolith]

Making them more of a threat then the flood

[stoic hamlet]

Something can be dangerous but not due to military might.

[crimson monolith]

Again, nothing can be a bigger threat than the flood

[dusk jetty]

I think 343 will change that comment

[stoic hamlet]

They don’t need to.

[crimson monolith]

They should

[stoic hamlet]

People are just dumb.

[dusk jetty]

“It’s the flood that makes the endless dangerous” or something

[carmine sleet]

Did you miss the part where I said the Forerunners are extremely biased in favour of themselves and their chosen successors?

[crimson monolith]

So I'm just dumb?

[dusk jetty]

343 never struck me as one to underestimate the flood

[crimson monolith]

I know that part

[crimson monolith]

Yet they've been very quiet on them since Awakening the Nightmare

They overall Halo story has focused and should focus on the flood

Even just as a background threat

[dusk jetty]

Good thing too, rather have them underutilized than overused and underpowered

[carmine sleet]

So you should be able to put together that the Forerunners are exaggerating how bad the Endless are because the Forerunners don't want their plans for humanity to be ruined by a species they didn't know would survive Halo's fire

[crimson monolith]

I want to see them more than less

[modest marsh]

The threat the endless poses from the perspective of the forerunners is because they serve to undermine the established order that they seek to enforce in order to protect the galaxy

[dusk jetty]

It needs to be in a certain capacity then

[autumn zephyr]

Yeah, never even crossed my mind lol. Just thought humans were the appointed successors. Funny how sometimes these massive things can fly over your head

[vernal ingot]

Fair enough I suppose

[stoic hamlet]

Well, that was perhaps a bit rude.

But people seem to think something can be dangerous just because it’s militarily strong.

But look at say, the French Revolution, or the various Communist uprisings of the 1920’s.

Those weren’t dangerous militarily, but they were politically and economically for the powers that be. In that sense they were worse than the Ottoman, Austro-Hungarian, and German Empires that they erupted from despite not having a fraction of the military might.

[modest marsh]

The fact that they were unaffected by the halo array means they have a massive advantage over every other intelligent species in the galaxy, and that includes subverting humanity as reclaimers

[dusk jetty]

I don’t want the flood to appear and then be defeated 3 times

They are a serious threat they should be treated as such

[crimson monolith]

History nerd and Halo nerd

[vernal ingot]

Agreed

[carmine sleet]

The Flood aren't the kind of threat that can just exist in the background. By the nature of them being a parasite which almost wiped out the galaxy, it can't just be some background threat. It's not like an empire or space pirates where they can retreat and bide their time. They are a threat which has to be dealt with before it consumes everything

[stoic hamlet]

I mean it was my professional career for a brief time, so yeah, I try to be informed on these things.

[dusk jetty]

Oh the flood can retreat

It very much uses deception to its advantage

[modest marsh]

Saturn Devouring his Son

🤓

[dusk jetty]

But it’s already done that feint

It won’t work again

It’s like a nighttime raid, you do it once you’ll never be able to get that result again

[carmine sleet]

This is the thing I don't get about people who want the Flood back constantly. They don't seem to understand that it would make the Flood less of a threat and more of an annoyance. It would lessen the impact of what the Flood is and make it more akin to a Saturday morning cartoon villain

[modest marsh]

The flood do already persist in the background but you can’t make them a consistent part of the storytelling of the games without minimizing their threat

lol jinx

[crimson monolith]

But the whole point of the rings was to kill the flood or their food which ever it is now, which means the whole human covenant war in one way or another was domino of causes starting from the flood. Literally almost everything in Halo has happened in one way or another because of the flood. They are the main focus in one way or another even just in the background or the cause in a long chain of events.

[dusk jetty]

The main focus is different from being a threat

[crimson monolith]

They are the main focus and the main threat

[dusk jetty]

An omnipresent flood is far preferable then a tangibly present one

[carmine sleet]

The Flood didn't start the Human-Covenant War

And we dealt with the Flood in Halo 3. There's been small pockets of Flood since then, but those have been dealt with

[crimson monolith]

They did in one way or another because they caused the forrunners to destroy themselves and caused their tech to be left behind

[modest marsh]

Halo is about interrogating the ethics of genocide if you’re purely talking about what the series is about on a thematic level

[crimson monolith]

And caused the confusion in Contact Harvest

[dusk jetty]

Cast a long shadow and move fast

[crimson monolith]

Because they pushed the forrunners to genocide

I can connect the dots all day

It makes sense

[dusk jetty]

We know, you don’t need to

[modest marsh]

The endless are victims of a genocide for the purpose of uplifting humanity over any other species just because they had an advantage

[carmine sleet]

Do you think Cleopatra started the American Civil War as well? Because that's how ridiculous you claiming the Flood started the Human-Covenant War sounds

[modest marsh]

Yes

[dusk jetty]

It’s absolutely not ridiculous at all

The flood did not do anything on harvest but they set the stage

[modest marsh]

You see, it all starts from the fall of the Roman Empire

[crimson monolith]

If you want me to be logically consistent, then I suppose I would have to say yes. But that feels like a logical extreme or an apples-to-oranges comparison.

[dusk jetty]

“A butterfly in Peking flaps its wings and you get rain instead of sunshine in New York.”

[vernal ingot]

Btw, somewhat unrelated, but post covenant war, I know there were a couple military academies where humans and elites trained together.

Do we have any info on a non military school like this? Like grunts and elites going to school with humans?

[dusk jetty]

It may seem unrelated but there is a series of events that tie them together

[crimson monolith]

Basically my arguement

But it my head it makes sense

[modest marsh]

Uh oh, he doesn’t know about Paxopolis

[dusk jetty]

Those events can take place hundreds of thousands of years later but they still are tied together

[vernal ingot]

Hm?

[crimson monolith]

Thank you

[modest marsh]

It’s better if you didn’t know

[crimson monolith]

That is my arguement

It's put way more elegantly

[carmine sleet]

That doesn't mean the Flood started the Human-Covenant War

[crimson monolith]

Indirectly they did

[vernal ingot]

This makes me more curious

[dusk jetty]

They didn’t push the button to glass harvest and that’s not what bepe is saying

[crimson monolith]

No what I am saying is they started the chain of events that would lead to it

[modest marsh]

They set up a joint occupation zone on Onyx where military personnel and civilian researchers could relocate their families to live there permanently in a shared municipality

[carmine sleet]

My dude, the Flood did not play some masterful gambit to create the Covenant to start the Human-Covenant War. It was all happen chance that the Covenant became a thing

[vernal ingot]

Do we have stories set here or is just mentioned?

[crimson monolith]

I also don't want there to be any hate, I'm just trying to get closer to the truth of the lore

This is fun

[modest marsh]

Legacy of Onyx

[dusk jetty]

That is intentional on the stories part too, there are multiple interweaving stories that come to fruition in the HCW

[vernal ingot]

Is it good?

[modest marsh]

No it’s cringe

[crimson monolith]

Maybe but in a way the flood started the events that would lead to the war of beginnings and therefore the creation of the covnenant

Hang on I'm at work and I got to do something rq brb lol

[modest marsh]

Half the book is high school drama because the protagonist Molly is trying to get over her racism against aliens

[vernal ingot]

Aw, that’s a shame. Sounds interesting. Like the idea of an elite kid being from a strict family and then cutting loose with human friends he warms up to over the story, playing games, watching movies, learning about each other, and there is a wise old grunt janitor who gives them advice and wisdom

[modest marsh]

Also she becomes best friends with Jul Mdama’s son

[dusk jetty]

Legacy of onyx is a strange book

[vernal ingot]

Like…. Imagine sandlot but halo

[vernal ingot]

That’s the bad guy in 4s fireteam right?

[modest marsh]

Jul Mdama is the supreme commander of the covenant remnant faction

[vernal ingot]

So, yes?

[modest marsh]

He was killed at the beginning of halo 5

He’s in Spartan Ops, yes

[vernal ingot]

Yup that’s him. Introduced in the fireteam in 4 and gets offed in cutscene

But do you think a more sand lot style story would have been more interesting for it?

I think so.

[modest marsh]

His other son is also in the story and he’s now taken over a different covenant splinter faction

[vernal ingot]

Weird

[modest marsh]

Yeah

What’s even weirder is that they just did this with the Banished too

[vernal ingot]

Huh?

[modest marsh]

Tartarus’s son is now the defacto leader of the Banished

[vernal ingot]

….. HUH???!?!?

[modest marsh]

Yeah, per Empty Throne

[vernal ingot]

I don’t know that book. Is that one with the Halsey clone/daughter?

[modest marsh]

Yes

[vernal ingot]

Weird

[modest marsh]

This is obviously pending Atriox’s return but due to the events of the battle of Zeta Halo, he’s currently the person that hold the most power in the Banished hierarchy

[vernal ingot]

Is he a good character? Like fun to read?

[modest marsh]

Which is particularly concerning because he’s just as much of a religious fanatic as his father

[modest marsh]

I’ll be honest, I don’t think he really gets enough to work with to appreciate him as a character

It’s a very bloated book with like a dozen different PoVs

Same with Cole’s daughter

[vernal ingot]

shame. Sounds sort of like they made him just to go “oh he’s that guy’s kids!”

[modest marsh]

It’s…complicated

From the way things were going, it really does seem like Severan (Tartarus’s son) was originally meant to be Voridus from Halo Wars 2, but they diverged into different characters

Severan’s canonical appearance was derived from unused concept art for Voridus

They even use similar weapons

[crimson monolith]

I'm sorry for arguing earlier guys lol, no hate

You guys are fun

[vernal ingot]

Do you offer the unggoy of apology?

[crimson monolith]

I do

[vernal ingot]

Hurray

[crimson monolith]

The rat of apology

[vernal ingot]

https://tenor.com/view/halo-grunt-cooking-gif-25317608

[crimson monolith]

Embed fail

1984

[modest marsh]

Anyways, it’s just one of those things where I can conceive of a reality where these ideas are satisfyingly executed, but it’s just a matter of accomplishing that without having to make too many compromises, which has been a recurring problem for Halo Studios, either because of resource constraints or mismanagement

[crimson monolith]

I just have small gripes with some of the retcons to the story and I know they can't really be fixed but I guess I just look at small details like that.

I can understand a bit of why it happened

I still love the overall story

Thats why I've bought nearly all the Halo books except 6

[modest marsh]

Sometimes you actually get some interesting narrative flourishes from the “mistakes”

[crimson monolith]

A little bit

It makes you think

[modest marsh]

The existence of retcons can recontextualize and add depth to ideas that previously seemed at odds with each other

[crimson monolith]

I just wish they would tie it together a bit better, I know they've tried to make all of it make sense but it comes a bit short for me

It does add depth

I can see the effort

[vernal ingot]

Don’t tell that to a world of Warcraft lore nerd. Retcons are ferociously hated there

[modest marsh]

I’d counter that with the elder scrolls where retcons have become an integral part of the settings’ world building and even metaphysics

[vernal ingot]

Shadowlands, expansion of retcons

[crimson monolith]

Hopefully in further books they can go back and connect it

[vernal ingot]

Elder scrolls makes sense cus the whole thing is a dream

[crimson monolith]

I'd like to see a book on what was going on; on 05 between 2 and 3

And what the crew was doing

That would be an awesome book

[vernal ingot]

Do we know what happened to spirit of fire btw? Cus it’s not in infinite

[empty bloom]

Of course it isn't, it can't leave the Ark.

It has no slipspace drive.

[vernal ingot]

Oh yeah…. Forgot infinite wasn’t on ark

[empty bloom]

...

How, lmao

[vernal ingot]

Didn’t play infinite

Only been playing master chief collection

[modest marsh]

Tbf that Spirit of Fire operation does seem to give the vibe that they planned for it to come to Zeta halo at some point

Or if you go even further back, that the setting of Infinite might’ve originally been I09 instead

[crimson monolith]

I mean if you have time you should

The story is alright

[vernal ingot]

Eeehh it felt a little weak. Plus open world feels like an odd choice for halo.

I watched via YouTube

[crimson monolith]

The open world was kinda underutilized

Most of the missions were indoors where enemies cam out of doors

Like Halo 2

[vernal ingot]

Yeah. Plus it felt like it was trying to be far cry with the outposts

A linear campaign style like the old game I think would have worked better

Also, no space rhinos

Much sad

[crimson monolith]

I mean the outposts were kinda fun

But it got old quick

And once you did everything there was to do

It was boring

[vernal ingot]

Just like far cry

[crimson monolith]

Yeah

It gets old fast

And I remember when you had to restart the campaign to replay missions

I'll give it one thing, Infinite is stronger than 5, and 4

[vernal ingot]

Also the boss fights are… weird

[crimson monolith]

They are

The one with the chieftan in that gun can be a headache

You often are out of ammo and you have the grapple around to avoid getting one tapped

[vernal ingot]

I just wished saving the marines actually added something. Like show us a unsc camp or cutscenes of survivors fortifying

Also… the monitor redesign is weird

[crimson monolith]

It is

I didn't like it

It was an improvement

[vernal ingot]

The one design that didn’t change through so many games and they change it for infinite, but not for forge

[crimson monolith]

The forge was amazing though

[vernal ingot]

Forge maps were great in reach

[empty bloom]

That's a hell of a thing to 'get a vibe' from.

I just figured they'd talk about the SoF then move on to the next 'hey look at this cool old lore' thing.

[modest marsh]

It’s clear to me at least that the next big story event was meant to be about connecting the academy storyline with the actual campaign, and them diverging from that to tell disconnected narratives via blogpost was a consequence of the multiplayer narrative being cancelled

Like, each (canon) core they added was supposed to be related to the story somehow, so if there’s a whole Mark IV core, what does that mean?

[vagrant ocean]

Not an actual redesign, it’s unique to 07. The regular monitor design is still canon and is even in the game in Forge.

[vernal ingot]

That’s good

[vagrant ocean]

I like to think that the MkIV cores are upcycled from ones used by IIs during the war, perhaps some spare parts being cobbled together to make full suits.

[modest marsh]

Several of the attachments are explicitly used by Red Team

[versed salmon]

Yeah not a fan

[vagrant ocean]

I wouldn’t be surprised if Materials Group still makes them.

Apparently there was a massive stock of MkIV at the Damascus archives.

[weary vessel]

Weird

Test

[vernal ingot]

Do we have any stories where covenant races react to earth animals?

I like the mental image of a hunter petting a rhino like it’s a big puppy

[crimson monolith]

I don't think so

But it would be funny

I want to see a brute fight a gorilla

[vernal ingot]

It would be

I want to see a grunt just snuggling a bunch of guinea pigs

And a parrot imitating a jackal

[crimson monolith]

Grunts are kind of cute in their own way

[vernal ingot]

They also like human tv shows

Or at least I heard they do

[crimson monolith]

In the books their cute too

[vernal ingot]

Isn’t there also a badass one that trains unsc soldiers now?

[carmine sleet]

An Elite kicks a Zebra in Hunters in the Dark if I'm remembering correctly. For context, the Zebra was running away from the Portal at Voi being activated and a Retriever Sentinel emerging from it

The Elite and a Spartan just happened to be in the direct path of the Zebra

[vernal ingot]

Mean

[vernal ingot]

That’s a mean elite

[carmine sleet]

He wasn't doing it to be mean, he didn't want to be trampled

[vernal ingot]

Still mean

[crimson monolith]

Hunters in the Dark is on my reading list now

[carmine sleet]

It's not the best novel admittedly, but it was written by the late Peter David (As in the creator of Spider-Man 2099)

[minor sky]

I like how Chief and Johnson have all these things explaining how they got off of Alpha Halo, but Stacker and Chips Dubbo are just "alive"

[autumn zephyr]

I like the explanation that Stacker and Dubbo are just built different

[vernal ingot]

Cus they are badasses

They are actually ancient humans who survived everything, got their memories wiped, and were planted on earth

[tawny yoke]

i know somethings being discussed here but i need to know real quick

is the Master Chief still just chilling on Zeta Halo right now?

like from a current-day lore perspective

[autumn zephyr]

As far as we know, there is a book out later this year following up with Chief on Zeta Halo

[vernal ingot]

No, he’s teaching the banished how to read right now

[autumn zephyr]

Edge of Dawn I think it’s called

[tawny yoke]

noted

[crimson monolith]

I'm thinking about preordering it on Amazon. It comes out in December

[autumn zephyr]

Very excited for it. If it’s a tenth as good as Empty Throne then we will be alright

[vernal ingot]

Btw, are the Cyclopes in halo wars 1 and 2 different marks? Cus the first one is clearly more like a mech/exo suit while 2’s is clearly w mech

[autumn zephyr]

Yes! Apparently in Halo Wars 1 they are Mark III [B] and in Halo Wars 2 they are Mark III [S]

Serina designed the [S] class during the time the Spirt of First was in slipspace, so they are exclusive to them alone

As an aside, I like how the mega bloks cyclops variants are canon

[vernal ingot]

Neat

[modest marsh]

the hw1 cyclops is more or less a dedicated engineering platform and cargo power loader rather than an actual weapon system intended to be deployed in the field

[indigo blade]

Its The Flood one of the DANGEROUS virus in fiction

[unique rune]

complex cellular parasite the Flood famously a viral disease

[modest marsh]

Likely no, but part of that is because it isn’t a virus and it isn’t even really that dangerous in its cellular form

The threat of the flood comes from its rapid accumulation of intelligence allowing it to reach parity with whatever civilization it ends up consuming

[zealous escarp]

very true, and to add to your point, it can be killed easily (starvation)

[zealous escarp]

i might get it but i wish it was dlc for campaign instead of a book.

[spark pivot]

uh, buddy, the flood is MOST dangerous in its cellular form

"One flood spore is enough to destroy a species"

look up ANY video that goes over how quickly the flood would take over if even just ONE spore made its way to earth

the only reason humanity didn't go extinct in halo 3 is because of plot convenience

and also glassing half of a continent

[modest marsh]

You’re conflating the potential danger of an unchecked outbreak with how threatening the flood is at its most basic level

The flood has never been depicted in the games at their most threatening

[spark pivot]

the flood starting in it's cellular form almost destroyed the galaxy once

[modest marsh]

If they did, then firing the rings would be the only thing capable of stopping them

[spark pivot]

underestimating it would have that happen again

you can't say that the flood isn't dangerous in it's cellular form when it nearly destroyed all life in the galaxy starting from it

the flood is dangerous, period

[modest marsh]

This may be a reading comprehension issue I’m afraid

[spark pivot]

for you

the flood in it's cellular form is wildly more dangerous because you won't know about it until it's too late

[modest marsh]

As opposed to what

Can you relay what you think I’m saying

[spark pivot]

ngl we're kinda just saying the same thing

I'm just trying to explain that saying that "the flood isn't that dangerous in it's cellular form" is very untrue

[modest marsh]

relative to what though

[spark pivot]

to anything tbh

any version of the flood is a quite possibly universe ending threat

a flood spore is just as dangerous as an infection form

one just does the job a lot quicker

both are a guaranteed death

[modest marsh]

okay well im talking about when the flood becomes industrialized and infects entire planets

[stoic hamlet]

The flood spores also don’t technically get nearly as lethal (comparatively) late in the infection cycle, when they start turning the area into blight lands.

You won’t really deal with a flood spore as a regular person.

[wintry sleet]

Lore chat… do we know if we’ve ever seen an albino elite?

[glossy sun]

I love how Chief knows how to drive everything from a Warthog to a starfighter like the Broadsword

[harsh ore]

I mean he is the ultimate super soldier

[glossy sun]

True

[soft plank]

Why is the Mark VI helmet in Halo:R ? The drill sargeant says at the start of H2 that the Mark VI is "Fresh out of the armory" (if I remember correctly)
But even if the Mark VI existed during the fall of Reach, why didn't Chief use that in CE ?

[autumn zephyr]

The in-game info for Halo Reach lists the Mark VI helmet as still being field tested and that information will be used to improve the final product. So the lore reason is that it’s a prototype before it was listed as field ready for the Spartan II’s a few months later

[soft plank]

👍 thanks mate

[autumn zephyr]

Glad I could help!

[torpid quail]

Hi

[carmine sleet]

To add to what Pav has said, there is also Mjolnir Black. Which is a prototype version of Mark VI utilised by Spartan Team Black. Visually it looked identical to Chief's Mark VI in Halo 2 but in all black and depending on the depiction, has a silver or gold visor with roman numerals corresponding to each member of Black Team

[empty bloom]

No. Jul is supposed to be oddly pale for an Elite (his model reflects this), but the rest of his textures and descriptions imply it's not noteworthy, so likely not albinism, more something along the lines of leukism.

[empty bloom]

Fresh out of the armory/production facility=/=First release of a product.

[pallid thicket]

So I was scrolling through comments on a YouTube short were two thirds of them were your typical “343 retconned the Forerunners” arguments and then I find the most hilariously L-take of a comment ever:

“Halo lore is ridiculous. It’s just an FPS game. The lore is simply filler designed to sell more content”

[frigid heart]

Halo fans are our own worst enemy

[crimson monolith]

This might be a stupid question, but I was thinking a bit last night, and I thought something. Is the overall story of Halo being told as a sort of documentary, or are we reliving events kind of like Assassin's Creed?

[carmine sleet]

No

Outside of the framing of MCC in its initial marketing as Locke watching footage of Chief's actions in the older games, the series is not someone reliving the events which happened

[modest marsh]

Empty Throne kinda toys with this idea tbf

As does Spartan Assault/Spartan Strike

[crimson monolith]

I mean it seems interesting as we the reader or whatever don't have a full understanding such as someone who is watching a documentary and even some Halo 3 marketing played with the idea.

And there is information lost to us like it would be a reader

[tawny yoke]

i swear there was one, like Jul ‘Mdama, unless that was just what the Elites looked like in that era of Halo idk

unless there was another reason, idk that much about Halo 4-5

[modest marsh]

Elites have a society built on eugenics and is extremely hostile towards perceived disabilities

Hatchlings are encouraged to cull the weak among them

[wintry sleet]

Time for me to make a new elite oc then

[tawny yoke]

yo im making one rn

[wintry sleet]

Twinning!!!

[modest marsh]

Albinism unfortunately has strictly negative effects on one’s health, particularly in terms of how it limits someone’s capacity to serve in combat

Impacts on eyesight and vulnerability to topical burns in particular are relevant

[wintry sleet]

Mhm

[glossy sun]

Sangheili life hard
The young are prohibited from seeing their parents

[modest marsh]

Not quite, they aren’t allowed to know their biological father

They can still form bonds with their father, but the exact lineage is obfuscated to prevent favoritism

Elites are culturally obsessed with meritocracy

[glossy sun]

Ah okay
So you think that's kinda calmed down under the Swords?

[spark pivot]

Yes and no

[modest marsh]

Arbiter is a progressive, so it’s probably on the docket of things to chill out on

Same with his approach with relaxing species and gender related restrictions

He doesn’t really have the authority to mandate something like that outside of his own clan but I’m sure he’s not as concerned about maintaining traditions like that as the Sangheili try to modernize

[glossy sun]

How'd they get the Mammoth to Requiem?

[carmine sleet]

It was on the Infinity

[glossy sun]

Okay
But how did they get it off the Infinity
I don't think a Pelican is bringing it down like a Warthog

[thorn spindle]

albatross dropships

or those big transport ships in halo wars

or frigates

[carmine sleet]

Frigates wouldn't be used for moving it, be something like a Darter and a Heron

[thorn spindle]

how bout frigates move it from infinity, and other dropship move from frigate

[modest marsh]

Not saying this is how, but it would be funny if they copied the way the Covenant deploys Scarabs

Aka dropping them

[glossy sun]

Oh yea that would be funny

I was thinking that it was just 3-4 Pelicans that carried it

The same way we saw the SoF's slipspace being carried in Halo Wars

[minor sky]

I just finished the Escharum fight in Halo Infinite and man.... I like the scene, I like it quite a bit. I just wish the story it was in was..... more

[hardy swan]

Atriox should have been the main villain

[modest marsh]

Considering that infinite was meant to be a “10 year platform” with the campaign internally considered season 1, he probably was

Escharum isn’t event the final boss, the harbinger is

Or, more accurately, Horatius, who is guarding the harbinger

[sick herald]

I didn't need Atriox to necessarily be the big bad in Infinite, but it was surprising that they gave so much focus to a Jiralhanae that we had never even heard of prior to the game only to have him finished off in the same game. The Prophet of Truth was a great villain because they were given time to develop over two games and a few books.

Rather than making Infinite a 'flavor of the week' boss-fight fest, they should've focused more on fleshing out and developing characters that could've persisted throughout the trilogy or whatever it was they had planned. The Spartan Hunters in particular should've played a role more like Nemesis in RE3 where they were constantly hounding the player. I almost feel like they would've a route like Shadow of War with the Nemesis system if it weren't somehow copyrighted by WB.

Thankfully they're at least continuing the story from Infinite and Rubicon Protocol in the upcoming novel. I'm more excited for that than I am for whatever game they're cooking up for next year.

[modest marsh]

The Nemesis System’s copyright is specific enough that you could easily tweak it to be legally distinct

you’re not necessarily far from the truth either

[glossy sun]

So what were the Banished after at Annex Ridge?

[unique rune]

not really anything specified
just using the location and facility for artifact research

[versed salmon]

We still don’t know anything about the October reveal right?

[modest marsh]

No

But if I had to guess, we’re getting a new multiplayer experience sometime soon, since they’re sunsetting HCS events for infinite

[vagrant ocean]

Herons.

[minor sky]

Info on Infinite's development makes reference to a "Warlord System" so perhaps they were planning something like that

My most recent playthrough of Infinite makes me kind of wish we got some missions playing as Jega trailing Chief

[carmine sleet]

Halo 7 with a SA2 inspired campaign with Chief on one side and Jega on the other will fix that

[minor sky]

Its a shame Stacker only got one line in Halo 4. Based on cut dialogue he was supposed to have more presence in the game, fighting along side you in the jungle

[crimson monolith]

The flood 👀

[minor sky]

Nah. I mean what would you even do with The Flood in the context of a new mainline Halo game that isn't just "Halo 3, again"?

[stoic hamlet]

Nothing, that’s the issue.

The flood suck as an antagonist.

[thorn spindle]

Can do anything u want, just need to change their goal and what characters are involved that react or respond, and change location, introduce a new factor, etc

U can see how the flood influences the story thru h1, h2, h3 as different situations and goals of all the characters intersect challenge and change eachother

There r many characters, locations, installations which if in a game with flood, especially if flood goals change via other story elements, it would be a different story than that of h1-h3

Similar to having halo games take place on a ring installation, such things change and mixup

[carmine sleet]

Problem with that is the Flood are pretty inflexible in what they're after. Unlike the Prometheans or the various aliens of the Covenant where you can change up their goals, the Flood only really have their need to consume all life. Changing up the characters dealing with it wouldn't somehow make the Flood more interesting, same with the location. Not sure what new factor could be added to the Flood which wouldn't fundamentally make it not the Flood

[thorn spindle]

imo thats just how flood fights, they eat and grow. once intelligent their goals can vary like any other group. stop a halo, maybe go after a specific target for more intel, take over an important military goal, etc

any new factor can be introduced like they always are for any group and every game

[orchid kettle]

I feel like what limits the Flood in my mind is just this vibe that they're essentially the endgame threat

And like, they're too sacred to use willy nilly

which maybe for some people that's a good thing and maybe if there's ever a big final Flood attack that caps the series off it will be

but for now I just get the sense that if you wanted to create any story involving the Flood, they need to be swiftly contained

[thorn spindle]

ye i feel like people limit the flood capability too much. they arent just dumb infecting things, their goals adapt to the situation the games, story, or other characters influence gives them. yea they consume all life if they can. the banished harvest all resources and grow all they can. unsc grows in strength or understanding if they can. etc

[carmine sleet]

Saying that the Banished harvest all resources feels pretty reductive of what they are

[thorn spindle]

yes those are base

[carmine sleet]

Like, they need those resources for building up their fleets, before the Brutes lost Dosiac, it was to ensure they could best other Covenant splinter groups, as well as find a Halo, since that would deter most from messing with them. Then with the loss of the Brute homeworld, they gained the additional goal of finding a new home for the Brutes, which alligns with the finding a Halo goal

The harvesting of resources is a means, not a goal

[thorn spindle]

yes thus how the story changes

[orchid kettle]

HW2 does kinda have this cute contrast going on between the Unsc and Banished based where our heroes use solar power while the Banished are drilling and extracting the Ark of its natural resources

[modest marsh]

“Natural”

[orchid kettle]

even though the UNSC has entire mining colonies too

but i dunno, i think its a cute lil thing

[carmine sleet]

As natural as it can be on a Forerunner installation

[modest marsh]

I don’t really think the flood’s goal changing is in the cards when narratively speaking they represent an eldritch horror and are a metaphor for divine retribution

Smh sunlight is a natural resource

[carmine sleet]

Fair point

But yeah, we're never going to see a Flood Combat form which goes "Hey guys, I know I'm a space zombie and all, but I just wanna settle down and sell flowers"

[modest marsh]

Does [God’s] goals change?

[orchid kettle]

I still find myself wishing we lived in the timeline where the Flood were a naturally occurring organism that was just crazy good at its ecological niche after it came into contact with sapient beings

[carmine sleet]

Or any Flood force with a goal that isn't consuming life

[orchid kettle]

then you'd have this idea that for all the Forerunners' power, they could not defeat nature itself

[modest marsh]

I think that’s sort of still in there?

[carmine sleet]

Like, the only reason we teamed up with the Flood in Halo 3 briefly was because Halo needed to be stopped, as soon as we did that, they immediately went back to trying to kill us since they didn't have to worry about their food source being wiped out

[modest marsh]

A defining feature of forerunner society is their desire to play god with the rest of the galaxy, when this isn’t really “supposed” to be the case

[orchid kettle]

Like in Human Weakness the Gravemind spins Cortana this tale about how he's actually the good guy because he's preserving countless consciousnesses within him for all time

[modest marsh]

They’re wrong to pursue it because it’s unnatural

[orchid kettle]

effectively creating the closest thing to Heaven through his fleshy gross body

and I kinda wish that just was his motivation

this warped sense of benevolence that doesn't really take the victim's own feelings into account

Or that like, the Gravemind himself was shaped by the thoughts and feelings of his victims, and the most common feeling he experienced was the fear of death

[thorn spindle]

he's a good fella

[orchid kettle]

well now we've been told he's just out to make all living life suffer for eternity because he's still miffed about what the Forerunners did

There's a clear separation I guess between his victims and the Precursors who birthed the parasite

[modest marsh]

I dont necessarily think these beliefs are necessarily mutually exclusive, it’s just a matter of your moral preferences

[orchid kettle]

I just want something a lil more cerebral

[modest marsh]

The Abrahamic version of the flood is explicitly a form of punishment for the sins of humanity, but it’s simultaneously being carried out by a benevolent god

[orchid kettle]

and at least after Epitaph, I don't really see the Flood as anything beyond essentially a god throwing a temper tantrum

[modest marsh]

That’s a contradiction that the source material includes

[orchid kettle]

Yeah but I wanted the intrigue to exist outside of the literary references

I wanted that to firmly be in the text

[modest marsh]

I mean, we can interrogate the idea using analogy which I thought was what they’re doing

But that might just be me projecting

The mythological flood being an event that was deliberately carried out by the deity of whatever culture that recorded it is something that’s very interesting from an anthropological perspective because it inherently requires the rationalization of a senseless genocide

Which is a common throughline in most Halo narratives

[orchid kettle]

The idea that its deliberate is more so something that wasn't really established until 343

[modest marsh]

I mean, the forerunners deliberately carried out a genocide

By firing the rings

It was just a different type of genocide than what the flood is doing

[orchid kettle]

Though according to some within Bungie they didn't even picture the Forerunners as necessarily worthy of being Flooded in the first place, strangely enough.

I like the Forerunners being worthy of contempt, that being said

[modest marsh]

The data drop revealing the motives for the Huragok to perpetuate the firing of the rings falls into this category, because they believed it to be the only means to restore order to the galaxy and bring about the return of their masters

[orchid kettle]

I think that's more interesting or at least more in line with my own personal beliefs with how the past is something that must be learned from and surpassed, not emulated

[modest marsh]

Which isn’t too different from the ideology of certain religious and political groups, if you catch my drift

[orchid kettle]

though Halo 4 is weirdly into the idea that its actually really cool that we're following in the Forerunners' footsteps for some reason

[modest marsh]

“We NEED to wipe the slate clean to bring paradise back to Earth”

[orchid kettle]

man Halo 4 has a really weird relationship with the Forerunners the more you think about it

"Their geneplan is superior"

There was this time in 343 media where the Forerunners' sin wasn't the fact that they created and enforced this hierarchy where they stood above the other races of the galaxy

but the fact that they stole this place at the top of the pecking order from us, the rightful rulers

like Space Hamlet

[minor sky]

Thats not really the vibe I ever got from it. The Didact sort of embodied the Forerunners and the very things that brought them to their knees. Meanwhile I saw the game's characterization of the Librarian more as somebody ensuring that Humanity will be able to surpass the Forerunners in their own path and give them the means to do so

Ultimately I do think the Forerunners in Halo 4 suffered from Chief and Cortana getting more focus in development

Which for the record was not a bad or unreasonable move, its the best part of the whole story

But based on some developer comments it seemed the Didact kind of fell by the wayside as being "Evil alien who wants to destory humanity" and demanding less attention.

Which iirc caught them a bit off guard when players complained about his presence in the narrative

[minor sky]

I generally like Majestic but I really wish their armor designs had more identity

[minor sky]

Ik Halo 4's armors were greatly lacking in tatical gear, but at the very least some additional colors would've been nice

[modest marsh]

I don’t mind fireteams having a set color scheme or armor composition when they’re first christened but they should adapt and change as individual Spartans get moved around and develop their individual specialization

Thorne is kind of egregious in that he stays wearing Recruit armor after participating in the Requiem campaign as well as the many other battles that take place in the escalation storyline

I also don’t like that Warrior and Soldier have been abandoned as the general purpose, most popular iterations of MJOLNIR for Spartan-IVs

Even cavallino replacing recruit feels wrong, even if they have a somewhat similar design

[modest marsh]

And to be clear it’s fine if we are meant to associate Recruit with Thorne but if they at least acknowledged the fact that he’s sticking with it out of preference, that would help justify that design choice

[stoic hamlet]

That’s more an issue with the armour being called “recruit” IMO.

It if was something else, it’d be fine.

I never really thought it made sense to be termed as such anyways. I can understand the idea, but the precedent it implied never seemed actually used.

[obsidian thistle]

Fun reminder Thomas wore Recruit from 2553 to at least 2558.

https://www.halopedia.org/Joel_Thomas

And he was one of the first SIVs

[glossy sun]

Bro really didn't want to upgrade lol

[hardy swan]

What are your guys opinions on Spartans IVs ruining the ODSTs?
Since anyone can be a Spartan IV now?

[modest marsh]

This is news to me

[carmine sleet]

I don't remember there being an occasion where the S-IVs ruined the ODSTs. Do you have a source you're citing for this?

[modest marsh]

Didn’t you hear? Everyone can be a Spartan-IV now.

[carmine sleet]

https://tenor.com/view/i-get-it-now-gif-1377156445417151910

[gusty star]

I love how people just made this up in their head and rolled with it without doing a lick of research for some reason

ODSTs still appear constantly in the lore, they just haven’t in the past three mainline games

Also Spartan IVs are pulled from the best of the best ODSTs and are still very expensive to make

There are not nearly as many Spartan IVs as there are ODSTs

[carmine sleet]

And that's not accounting for the fact that not all Spartan IVs are former ODSTs, Locke was ONI and Tanaka was Army, for example

But again, like with the former ODSTs who are Spartans now, they had to be really good at what they did to be recruited for the IVs

[vagrant ocean]

IVs are selected, ODSTs are still active in universe, with Master Sergeant Marcus P. Stacker overseeing 9th Platoon during Blue Team’s GEN3 training in 2559.

[vagrant ocean]

This is true, there’s at least 40,000-100,000 ODSTS

[carmine sleet]

As for the ODSTs and their lack of appearances in 4, 5 and Infinite, they just simply wouldn't make sense to appear in Halo 5 given the story doesn't really put us anywhere under UNSC jurisdiction, Halo 4 could've worked some in for Reclaimer but it wouldn't be worth making ODST assets just for one mission, and Infinite's likely just a case of them deeming it not worth making a marine variant which is an ODST over spending those resources elsewhere

[vagrant ocean]

There’s 300-500+ IVs.

[gusty star]

I think before the Created take over there was probably close to 2x that much to be honest

[vagrant ocean]

ODSTs are not only more plentiful, but still serve their intended purpose, because while ODSTs could be described as a scalpel with the IVs being a surgical laser, sometimes all you have is a scalpel. If I have a conflict on some border world, why would I waste IVs when ODSTs are just as good?

Besides, people could consider the deployment of Spartans to a minor border world experiencing an uprising to be overkill.

However, if a conflict or battle was large or important enough, a joint deployment of IVs and ODSTs would be amazing.

[carmine sleet]

Or they believe an asset on a long dead world is worth the deployment of both (Even if it didn't go as planned due to said asset being used to destroy incoming dropships)

[hardy swan]

some random youtuber said it since ODSTs were like humanity's heroes and all just being human but now the IVs exist kind of replacing them because any human can join

[vagrant ocean]

Also can I just say, the Requiem Campaign was a MASSIVE success for the nascent Spartan branch? 300 Spartans deployed to the planet, only 11 deaths.

[vagrant ocean]

ODSTs are not the heroes of humanity. They’re not the ones on the propaganda posters.

And even then, it’s not any human, you have to prove yourself to be WORTHY of becoming a Spartan.

[carmine sleet]

I'm trying to think who those deaths are. Castle, at least one member of Switchback and who else?

[carmine sleet]

Random YouTubers are not great sources to cite

[vagrant ocean]

Mountain Squad

[carmine sleet]

I forgot about Mountain

[hardy swan]

I think there are more since there is 300 on Infinity alone, 70 on Laconia and probably many more in other facilities

[vagrant ocean]

This was the number last given as a specific. It’s probably slightly higher given the 2 years since the Requiem Campaign.

[vagrant ocean]

This is a casualty rate of 3.6% repeating, the best of ANY Spartan operation prior.

[hardy swan]

it's like ODSTs are already these amazing soldiers

[vagrant ocean]

And they can be made BETTER.

[gusty star]

There are different tiers of skill my guy

[carmine sleet]

Plus in general, in the post war, the UNSC would want a much cleaner version of the Spartans since having them all be child soldiers is not a great optic

[gusty star]

ODSTs are necessary to fill the gap between the average marine and the Spartan IVs

[vagrant ocean]

Yep.

[carmine sleet]

And the IIs and IIIs aren't actually invincible so they'd need to have something as effective to replace the ones who have fallen

[vagrant ocean]

Especially when you consider that the UNSC has equipped some with the ORCUS exoskeleton.

[vagrant ocean]

And GEN2 and 3 MJÖLNIR bring them to Spartan-II levels.

[hardy swan]

I seriously hope 343 doesn't turn every ODST we know to SIVs... they are already halfway there

[carmine sleet]

Indeed

[carmine sleet]

I mean, they haven't done that

Like, where are you getting this "Halfway there" thing from

[spark pivot]

... they didn't ruin the ODST's, both still have their place in combat (for now)

[hardy swan]

the entirety of Alpha Nine

[carmine sleet]

One unit of ODSTs is not proof half of all ODSTs are now Spartans

[vagrant ocean]

They’re not even remotely half way. Again, there’s at minimum 40,000 ODSTs. And that’s not the only group that they pull from. Many are from the Navy, Air Force, and Army. Some are standard Marines.

[vagrant ocean]

Not the entirety

[spark pivot]

Ah yes because alpha nine was definitely half of the named ODST's (they're not)

[hardy swan]

they better leave Kilo 5 alone

[vagrant ocean]

No need to make a clandestine unit all Spartans. Kinda defeats the purpose.

[gusty star]

Why are you like accusing them of doing something they’re not

[vagrant ocean]

It’s what Halo fans do.

[vagrant ocean]

Also, good thing 343i doesn’t exist.

[carmine sleet]

Kilo-5 wasn't exactly an ODST only unit, given it featured multiple Spartans (Even if one was a washout and groomed by the head of ONI to be her successor)

[vagrant ocean]

And who would’ve lived an objectively worse life outside of the program. And Osman got lucky, she can walk and isn’t afflicted with Parkinson’s.

[carmine sleet]

Indeed

[vagrant ocean]

And she has skin, something 075 can’t say.

[carmine sleet]

Either way, I doubt we'll be seeing the ODSTs of Kilo-5 coming back as Spartan IVs

[vagrant ocean]

And she’s not a deformed mutant like Soren.

[hardy swan]

let's be real it's so much easier to say than Halo Studios

[spark pivot]

well at the end of the day, I'm just going to put it like this, ODST's are like USA's delta force, while spartans, are well, spartans. At the end of the day, it does NOT make sense for a spartan, who are WAY more expensive per unit with mjolnir, and whose scope of operations actually isn't as wide as an ODST

[vagrant ocean]

Not really, just say HS.

[hardy swan]

okay

[spark pivot]

also doesn't this exist already

[vagrant ocean]

Huh

[spark pivot]

or am I mixing up black ops with cladestine

I probably am

[vagrant ocean]

Black ops are basically classified assaults, mainly assassinations and the like. Clandestine ops are closer to espionage.

[hardy swan]

so you're saying not every ODST that does something extraordinary gets approached by the SIV guy

[spark pivot]

oh that yeah

[vagrant ocean]

They can be approached by a recruiter, but they can say no.

Because it’s voluntary.

[spark pivot]

source: edward buck

[hardy swan]

I thought ODSTs were supposed to be extraordinary

[spark pivot]

who literally said no at first

[vagrant ocean]

Yeah, and IVs are gods among men.

[spark pivot]

yes, but not all of them are physically capable of handling the augmentations

[hardy swan]

he's one of my favs spartan IVs

[spark pivot]

as much as people say "Any person can join the spartans now!" it's still not true

[hardy swan]

Buck became a spartan at like 40?

[vagrant ocean]

This too. The augmentations still have a lot of risks that requires comparability.

[vagrant ocean]

Yerp

[spark pivot]

age isn't the main issue (although I'm sure it's part of it)

it's genetics and how your body treats the fact that literally every organ that can be replaced in your body was replaced

along with other things

[vagrant ocean]

Project ORCHID just removed the age limit pretty much. I’m sure that if a 50 year old who’s biologically 30 could undergo the procedure

[spark pivot]

some peoples bodies will just say HELL NAW to the augmentations

[spark pivot]

this is the other note

the amount of time spent in cryo for a UNSC soldier probably means that they're a good few years younger physically then they are

[vagrant ocean]

It also SEVERELY lessened the genetic requirements

[hardy swan]

but we don't have any examples of SIV washouts except for the prototypes like ilsa Zane

[vagrant ocean]

Exactly, that’s how safe the procedure is.

[spark pivot]

thats not true...

[vagrant ocean]

Compare that to ASTER which led to half of all candidates washed out and half of them died.

[spark pivot]

the fact that we havent heard of any washouts, doesn't mean there were none

[vagrant ocean]

Or they could have been rehabilitated.

[spark pivot]

are the UNSC also able to do MUCH better investigation to "guarantee" the augmentations wont be rejected by your body? yes.

is it a guarantee your body wont reject the augmentations still? no. no it's not

tbh, I feel like we probably won't hear of any spartan IV washouts for awhile, because tbh they're just not that relevant in the story

[vagrant ocean]

I want to learn more about II washouts. See if any got better. Like Cass, she was still under rehabilitation in 2552

[spark pivot]

unless one of the enemies turns out to be an ODST who's mad at the UNSC bc he washed out of the spartan program, bc his body rejected an augmentation and it "ruined his career"

[vagrant ocean]

And it’s been 8 years

[hardy swan]

I don't want anymore Spartan or ODST traitors

[vagrant ocean]

It’s an inevitability.

[hardy swan]

I just want the Spartan IIs to have a reunion

[vagrant ocean]

Where? Hell?

[spark pivot]

ah yes, because people don't have very valid reasons to not like the space age equivalent of Britain

[hardy swan]

they are more like the USA

also

you're speaking like a traitor right now 🤨

[spark pivot]

when did the USA go out and colonize everything they could 💀

[spark pivot]

this isn't helldivers chill out democracy officer

[vagrant ocean]

The UNSC, though corrupt, is not as bad as people say it is. The CAA and CMA are much worse.

[spark pivot]

this is true

[hardy swan]

there is a difference between colonising uninhabited planets and countries with people

800 colonies and not a single one had a native alien population

[spark pivot]

although at the end of the day instead of going to war with colonies who wanna be independent, we could just like, idk, use common sense and have a treaty instead 💀

[spark pivot]

people which now want to leave (the UNSC)

also

yk

[hardy swan]

why be independent? Earth is humanity's home! the UEG is the government! unity is strength!

[vagrant ocean]

Technically they did, they have native fauna.

Rekt

[spark pivot]

besides the wildlife 💀

[hardy swan]

animals and plants don't count!

[carmine sleet]

Not everyone likes the idea of living out on a colony and being governed by people who don't live there

[vagrant ocean]

They do. They’re extraterrestrial.

By definition

Don’t play semantics with me young buck.

[spark pivot]

but regardless, the UEG more than kinda abandoned (if by necessity) the outer colonies

[hardy swan]

I think people in the UEG are made to think Earth is special

[spark pivot]

you started it 💀

[hardy swan]

Yeah that is wht happens when a genocidal alien covenant attacks you

[vagrant ocean]

It was 100% necessary. Pull back all UNSC and CMA personnel to more defendable planets vs wasting 6 years to retake a world on the edge of known space seems like common sense.

[hardy swan]

Also most colonies had less than a billion in population. Most flora and fauna are unaffected

Reach the most populous colony had like 700 million people

[spark pivot]

unfortunately, they also kind of hid the genocidal aliens and even when they did become public knowledge, half of them didn't believe it because they had been lied to and extorted so much by the UEG already

[hardy swan]

don't they have access to the holonet

[spark pivot]

what part of hidden

intelligence agencies like ONI do very good jobs of hiding things they don't want out there and making it seem like lies or creepypastas or conspiracy theories

[hardy swan]

I feel like it should be very hard to hide the fact that half of humanity's colonies are now made of glass

[vagrant ocean]

It wasn’t hard in the first decade. It wasn’t until the refugees started showing up.

That word got out.

[hardy swan]

Im sure if they just talk it out it would end in peace

[vagrant ocean]

Btw, the glassing of Bliss was on the holo net.

[spark pivot]

you do remember that cross world communication was still slow, and there's not exactly much time to make a twitter post about "OMG, my world is like, under attack by these monsters!" when there's already VERY few people making it out of the attacked worlds

[vagrant ocean]

Most of Harvest’s population escaped

[spark pivot]

did they?

welp

still the point that internet between worlds isn't like it is here, there's at least a month or two of delay between systems

[hardy swan]

have you seen people irl

TikTok people especially

[spark pivot]

those same people wouldn't be thinking about filming when they're watching a 9 foot tall alien blast their best friend to mist and boiling blood

heck look at their reactions in the halo TV show, the innie kids, they were all high, but once people started getting vaporized they realized what was up VERY quickly

[vagrant ocean]

I’m so glad I didn’t watch the show.

[hardy swan]

we need the opposite happening with the spartans

invading some covie planet and blasting everyone

[spark pivot]

it really isn't that bad (would've been better without some fanservice scenes, but it wasn't that bad)

[spark pivot]

... that happened, the spartans got obliterated

(that was literally what the spartan III's were doing)

[hardy swan]

try again!

like gray team blew up an entire planet

[spark pivot]

. . .

sigh

[vagrant ocean]

Watch as John-117 commits a war crime before going to Reach City.

[spark pivot]

he didn't commit any war crimes though?

???

[vagrant ocean]

He did the horizontal tango with a POW, that’s 1000000% a war crime.

[stoic hamlet]

Which is one of those things that shouldn’t be possible.

Generally it’s not until the end of the war that humanity has FTL comms, like the Slipspace probes.

What they do have is fast courier ships, though these are only as fast as human Slipspace and etc allows.

Which isn’t very fast unless the plot makes it

[vagrant ocean]

Blame the writers of Halsey’s Journal

[thorn osprey]

I wouldn't consider Master Cheeks fan service

[stoic hamlet]

Halsey’s Journal doesn’t imply Bliss was live-streamed. The date of the entry is April, and Bliss was destroyed in February.

The text implies they were shown classified footage recovered after the battle/glassing.

Yeah, the text notes Section II sent ships with information to various Outer Colonies with footage.

It wasn’t a live stream nor was it posted on any contemporary internet sites, at least, none that could go FTL (because those don’t exist yet at the time)

[vagrant ocean]

I never said it was live streamed. Not once.

The report was.

It was on the Intersystem News

Reported 2 months later.

The headline literally reads like the opening of a Clone Wars episode.

BLISS DECIMATED!!!

[spark pivot]

I mean the end of episode 2, and chief and makees fun time scene

[stoic hamlet]

Ahhh, I misread your original comment as implying it was live streamed, my bad.

[vagrant ocean]

Which is a war crime.

[stoic hamlet]

^^^

[spark pivot]

Oh that

[vagrant ocean]

Yeah.

The horizontal tango

[spark pivot]

Didnt know that was a war crime tbh

Makes sense thinking about it though

[thorn spindle]

i wonder how Mr Gravemind feels about the Endless

[modest marsh]

You’re not accounting for combat losses

The Requiem campaign allegedly killed a lot of Spartan-IVs

In almost every story that features Spartans-IVs, at least a few die

And well, Laconia blew up

It’s possible there have been more than 1000 or even 2000 Spartan-IVs successfully augmented, but that doesn’t mean that’s how many were active at any given point in time

[modest marsh]

I think this gets overstated a bit

Obviously the curve has been flattened

But there’s still meaningful distinctions in breadth of experience

And moreover, Halo 5’s depiction aside, the IIs should still have a physiological advantage

I’d heard that the Master Chief had once fallen to a planet from orbit and survived—back in the days when he and Cortana were working on the same side—but those Spartan-IIs had been literally made to be invincible. They’d figured out how to cut some costs by the time they got around to me, so who knows how I would have ended in that kind of fall. In any case, I had no desire to test my luck—although I wasn’t sure I would have much of a choice.

This quote from Buck comes to mind

It’s a case of unreliable narration but the guy is doubting if he’ll survive an unassisted free fall impact when IIs have survived worse in older gear

While the full potential of your enhanced physical capabilities are difficult to predict, this is not to say that Spartans should go looking for their limit. Follow all Spartan training guidelines and medical protocols. You are too valuable to endanger just to test the limits of augmentation. In the absence of established benchmarks, we encourage you to find your limits through safely monitored strength training. In the field, Spartans have been recorded lifting Warthogs, bending steel, and shattering concrete. Performing and improving on these feats of strength should serve as inspiration for your training.

Training Note: The War Games training facility is built on a series of hydraulic platforms that lift and move sections of the environment. These platforms can push and pull with tremendous force, and they make for terrific "weight machines" for Spartan-IVs. In your free time, you are encouraged to test your new musculature and bone density in this way with a fellow Spartan.

This bit from the field Manual also makes it clear that IVs don’t just pop out of the surgeries and get stuffed into a mjolnir suit and expect to be just as strong as someone who’s been doing it for years

If nothing else, figuring out how your muscles and bones work from scratch is naturally going to have a bit of a learning curve

[orchid kettle]

the IVs are at least stronger than Noble Six because they can keep their DMR from blooming out of control

🙂‍↕️

[modest marsh]

Nah the barrel is just flaring at the muzzle from overheating smh

[thorn spindle]

yea its cool everything isnt just ultra realistic for realism stuff like fun and balance r important

like if spartan bodies float down a stream such as on valhalla, not realistic but funny to look at

[empty bloom]

Not quite.

I actually have a bone to pick with that and the interpretation of a lot of GEN2.

The fan interpretation, that is.

Six survived an orbital drop in Mark Vb with a reentry pack and likely broke something given his health and behavior in the following mission.

Chief technically survived three low orbit drops, but the context for each connotates some reason why he'd have been fine that gets exaggerated;

• The first drop in Mark VI was stopped before he would've actually hit atmosphere, so no reentry.
• The second drop, also in standard Mark VI, was stopped utilizing a Forerunner hull plate to survive the reentry burn, but also was likely not nearly as high as the original drop's distance, with it shedding more or less all the heat he would've taken.
• The third drop in Mark VI MOD is... Weird. It can be assumed Cortana assisted with that drop, or that some nature of Requiem attempts to reduce the speed of falling objects in order to mitigate damage to localized areas, or both.

I also strongly doubt Chief figured he'd survive the second or third on a hunch when he did either. Both were attempts made more out of need than want.

[modest marsh]

“First drop?”

When Chief falls in halo 3 he is traveling at a faster initial velocity than his terminal velocity

There’s also a second landing in halo 4 where he’s propelled by the Didact’s slipspace rupture

[empty bloom]

Halo 2

[empty bloom]

Which the shield would account for.

[modest marsh]

No it wouldn’t

He’s still burning up on impact

[empty bloom]

On what grounds is it not helping?

[modest marsh]

Oh it is helping

Just not compared to a terminal velocity free fall

[empty bloom]

And I'm not surprised in the slightest that MJOLNIR would be burned by doing that.

[modest marsh]

You should be able to tell that by just looking at the impact crater

Or the fact that the impact made a fireball explosion

[empty bloom]

I'm saying it lessened it enough that it was no longer lethal.

[modest marsh]

I think you’re downplaying relevant factors that differentiate this from actual free fall

[empty bloom]

It also would've shed a lot of additional heat and slowed speed due to his trajectory.

I think you're overplaying relevant factors that differentiate this from actual freefall, so we're at an impasse.

[modest marsh]

The impact made a swimming pool sized hole in the ground

He exploded like a bomb

[empty bloom]

Shrug.

[modest marsh]

Falling at terminal velocity won’t do that

[empty bloom]

Shrug, again.

It's Bungie.

[modest marsh]

What are you talking about

[empty bloom]

What are you?

[modest marsh]

When Chief jumps off the anodyne spirit it only just started entering earth’s atmosphere for a few seconds where it’s visibly traveling at hypersonic velocities

[empty bloom]

My point is that visuals don't tell the whole story, logic needs to come into the picture more than visuals regarding depictions of Spartans in free fall.

[modest marsh]

The piece of hull he ripped off slowed him down and reduced atmospheric burn up

[empty bloom]

Okay, so we both understand that much, got it.

[modest marsh]

But he was still traveling at hypersonic velocities

[empty bloom]

Except I highly doubt he was when he actually landed.

[modest marsh]

He’s visibly still burning when he hit the ground

[empty bloom]

Which is why I said this.

[modest marsh]

I have no idea what this means

[empty bloom]

And your lack of an idea is why I said this.

[modest marsh]

I already mentioned several factors besides just pure visuals

Unless you doubt any element of the presentation

Or the fact I just quoted text describing it

[empty bloom]

I feel like that's basically the entire implication of my statement, is that I doubt he himself was in a fireball at any point in 3.

[modest marsh]

It’s in the concept art which you can even see in a halo 4 terminal

[empty bloom]

Good for the concept art, I really don't care about concept art.

[modest marsh]

Hence the second part

It’s presented in universe as a representative account

[empty bloom]

Good for the Halo 4 terminal and its quasi-canon status.

[modest marsh]

“Quasi canon” as you’ve determined on what grounds?

You’ve now declared that neither halo 3 nor halo 4 is fully canon based on what

[empty bloom]

Literally just world logic. Why is there a terminal that plays a recorded history of Chief's role, in a voice that isn't Chiefs or Cortana's, that plays a slideshow of concept art and explains history that it shouldn't be privy to if it's neither, in a forgotten part of a cryo chamber that Chief canonically can't be locked into because it's an entirely different ship model than the Halo 3 version?

By basic implication it's in a status of quasi-canon.

[modest marsh]

You dont think Cortana could synthesize something like that to tell someone who finds Chief who he was?

[empty bloom]

It's not that I don't think she can, I don't see why she'd want to.

[modest marsh]

Just because she didn’t do the voice over doesn’t mean she didn’t do it

Okay, that’s subjective

[empty bloom]

I mean, you're arguing against at least five gates of SODB.

[modest marsh]

Can you raise any counter evidence that Chief didn’t survive a fireball explosion in halo 3 despite what the cutscene and level design show us so I can decide that’s quasi canon too?

This is a tiresome way to engage with the fiction

[empty bloom]

Not really, for me.

I suspend my disbelief accordingly, because sometimes you need air in space to have an X-Wing do a cool stunt.

The actual cutscene in question just shows a traveling fireball object; To me, that's the shield taking pretty much all of the heat, which tracks with the thing still smoking in the morning.

[modest marsh]

This is an extremely condescending and smug way of engaging with the art if you think that unrealistic fiction is subject to being “outsmarted” to determine what the “true canon” is

[empty bloom]

Right, and I'm the subjective one here.

[modest marsh]

I didn’t say you’re not allowed to have an opinion

You’re saying mine is wrong because it adheres too closely to what is shown

In contrast to your more cerebral approach

[empty bloom]

It's a known and common issue that Halo's cutscenes and gameplay do not match very closely with the actual reality of canon for a reason, which is why I take the approach I do.

[modest marsh]

The shield isn’t made of any combustible material and is completely spotless besides soot on its surface, so the only explanation is the oxygen around it was burning due to hypervelocity friction

[empty bloom]

Well, issue if you don't like it, at any rate.

But yet, not Chief, who is cold enough to touch and approach just fine.

[modest marsh]

Hours later

[empty bloom]

But yet the shield is still blisteringly hot.

[modest marsh]

And?

What are you even arguing against

I never said that Chief didn’t benefit from the shield at all

[empty bloom]

My point's that it took more heat than him, Chief likely wasn't actually part of the fireball-the shield was.

[glossy sun]

So what do the Created forces look like?
They're using the Amigers and Promethean Knight from 5 right?

[empty bloom]

And drone forces and presumably co-opted local troops if there are any.

[modest marsh]

He was holding onto the shield till the point of impact, hits his chest on it causing the dent, and recoiled backwards into the mud several meters behind him

[glossy sun]

Ah okay
Yea because I swear I read somewhere that Created AI were allowed to go into a Promethean Knight shell

[empty bloom]

That's because they can.

Human AIs are basically a very primitive form of composition.

[glossy sun]

Ah okay that's cool
Yea I want the UNSC forces in my little Halo AU fic to combat the Created (or remnants) but just wondering how to write the enemy forces

[empty bloom]

The Created also have one canon Executor that we know of.

[modest marsh]

Wait, are you under the impression that the heat of meteors is what causes the size of the explosion they cause on impact?

[empty bloom]

No.

[glossy sun]

Wait really?

[modest marsh]

That seems to be what you’re implying here

[empty bloom]

Which is a weird way to read into it.

[modest marsh]

Where is Chief in your mind the split second before the shield hits the ground

[empty bloom]

Judging by his landing position, over top of it but not 'riding' it at that point, something intentionally done due to the massive difference in landing direction from the keyship.

My presumption is that an exterior hull panel of a Forerunner voidcraft meant for repeated reentry and reescape over a long service career would be more than capable of allowing Chief, in conjunction with his shields and armor, to sustain him in a living form and taking pretty much all of the heat that he would've absorbed from reentry-which is noted as being the single most significant threat to a Spartan enduring reentry.

[modest marsh]

I don’t think the Heat played a significant factor in the survivability of the impact

[empty bloom]

It's what's most pointedly mentioned as a problem in regards to surviving reentry in MJOLNIR.

[modest marsh]

Where?

[empty bloom]

IIRC, Glasslands.

Naomi mentions it.

... Wait

No this would be Ghosts of Onyx, I think. I know a II specifically is the one who brings it up, because they're trying to think about how to survive such a fall.

[modest marsh]

Kelly

[empty bloom]

Anyways, yeah. Heat's mentioned to be the bigger killer-the suit can tank the heat and still function, but the person inside can't. The actual impact got absorbed by the layer of gel, as the Corpsman mentioned, but if Chief had, say, hit-square on, he'd have died, which explains the radically, and likely personally directed, difference in direction.

[modest marsh]

She could jump. Kelly and the other Spartans of Red Team had survived a high-altitude jump out of a Pelican—but not like this. The Beatrice was in midorbit. At high velocity, her MJOLNIR armor might survive the turbulence and heat—but inside, she’d be pulped and roasted.

It’s mentioned as a killer for her in this specific circumstance

Relevant to her is the fact she’s only wearing Mark V which is notably less resilient than Mark VI

[empty bloom]

(Of course, this brings Halo 4 into question, but that's mostly why I assume a mixture of Cortana trying to use inbuilt thrusters and Forerunner nonsense is involved here)

[modest marsh]

In the unused dialogue she claims to overcharge his shields

[empty bloom]

I mean, that'd make some amount of sense. Maybe not all of it, because you'd figure at a certain point you'd still just pop like a bug on a windshield.

But that's Halo 4 for you.

[modest marsh]

In any case there’s no special attention being paid to the heat, and while it’s not good to be set on fire from extreme temperatures, we know that MJOLNIR is weirdly more resilient against extreme heat than it “should” be

Cue Oblivion saying that Spartans in Mark IV need to be directly hit by a plasma mortar to kill them in the same breath as saying it can vaporize everything in a 20 meter radius

[stoic hamlet]

Denning tends to both underrepresent and over exaggerate the MJOLNIR armour like no one else.

[modest marsh]

No it makes perfect sense if you just interpret the bullets as being as strong as Wraith mortars

Or capital ship energy projectors apparently

At least Fred didn’t have to worry about infection. His helmet hadn’t actually been breached by plasma bolts, and its titanium-alloy shell was more than enough to protect him from the flash heat of any strike short of a capital ship’s plasma lance.

Sorry, “only” a plasma lance

Anyways @empty bloom more to the point, what actually causes damage to Chief’s suit out of any of this was the impact to his chestplate

Given that the only thing durable enough nearby to do that is the forerunner shield, I think it’s pretty much a safe assumption he was holding it till the point of impact wherein he slams into it and recoils off

This means he only sustained a fraction of the actual impact force, but my contention is that this is still well in excess then if he simply jumped out of a pelican at 30000ft

Which is more or less what’s happening with Buck

Locke in Halo 5 seems to imply that Osiris needs to get to a safer altitude before jumping off the Guardian when they arrive at Genesis before making a controlled descent using thrusters, so that’s another example of IVs exhibiting caution where a II needn’t

Meanwhile, in Halo Wars 1, they seemingly imply that Red Team dismounted the Spirit of Fire sans SOEIV pod without any issue

And Jerome got off the Enduring Conviction…somehow

[empty bloom]

I don't think it is a matter of not needing to.

I don't think either would actually really need to.

For example, Osiris, in the same game, did a HALO jump with nothing but MJOLNIR from what looks to be a roughly analogous height onto a planet that has a higher gravity than the Forerunner world they jumped on.

[modest marsh]

Maria’s armor testing of the Mark VI also comes to mind as an example of reentry burnup being manageable

She uses a parachute to slow her descent only after breaching atmosphere

[minor sky]

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/N5Dna1

I remember looking at this concept art a while ago, seeing the Melee concept explorations and thinking "Looks cool, but a genetically augmented super-solider in power armor wouldn't need that". Its finally hit me that actually this would make perfect sense for an ODST

Especially if they are smashing Wraiths with their on hands

[thorn spindle]

lots of possibilities! esp for units weaker than spartans. i agree spartans r already so op some things would just get in the way. odst with some gravity palms or something lol. like a cheap little addition instead of getting them in full armor

similar to jackal shield instead of jackal armor

[modest marsh]

marathon cyborg: am i a joke to you

[minor sky]

The Marathon Security Officer doesn't need no fancy-shmancy brass knuckles. He has the finest duel-wield double-barrel WSTE-M5 Shotguns a hidden MIDA weapon cache can give you

[orchid kettle]

Rakshasa does have shock knuckles, and I kinda figure most armor pieces from that core are scavenged bits and bobs from elsewhere in the wider Halo universe rather than purposefully designed for MJOLNIR

[spark pivot]

none of the gloves on rakshasa are shock knuckles? that's a wrist attachment for Mirage IIC iirc

[frigid heart]

The liteknuckle gloves are supposed to be shock knuckle mount points

[minor sky]

Yeah, the Shockbrace is on Mirage

[minor sky]

I think it is important that we remember the real MVP of Halo 5's story, Lieutenant Jet, who came in clutch with the emergency Slipspace jump

If not for him, Infinity would be gone

[carmine sleet]

https://tenor.com/view/marathon-2-durandal-marathon-bungie-marathon-durandal-marathon-shotgun-gif-18355177527871906496

[modest marsh]

Do you think he feeds the tubes with his mouth

[empty bloom]

A full brace is on Mirage, but there is a set of gloves for Rakshasa that are mounting points for shock knuckles.

[minor sky]

"While going through some data I appropriated from the Marathon (looking for design notes, of course) I stumbled across a reference to a weapon used by Imperialist forces against the insurrectionists during the Ares Raid; July 14, 2444. (Never heard of it? I’m not surprised!) Many years of loving craftsmanship went into the design and construction of this brutal tool of mayhem, I hope you can appreciate that. I won’t waste my time trying to explain the loading mechanism to you -- your primitive mind could never grasp its complex nature."
-from Marathon 2 manual

[latent junco]

Not actually on the gloves per-se, but

[spark pivot]

Ah I just misremembered then

[modest marsh]

Makes you wonder what’s supposed to be going on with Chief’s grappleshot in infinite

I mean I guess they could just choose to never acknowledge the upgrades you get in the campaign

But that one waypoint chronicle with blue team getting their new armor has Kelly explicitly getting the escape velocity upgrade

[minor sky]

Looking back, I think Alpha Nine or at the very least Buck could've been used to way better effect for establishing the post-war universe to players.

Just from my point of view, Buck's persepctive/background would be a very natural way of showcasing the transition of the galaxy from war to a shakey peace.
Hell, much as I love Throne and think he should've been in Halo 5, getting Buck to replace him was the most obvious choice. I just wish they actually did something with him

I mean one of his major character traits is being untrustworthy of ONI, and he is serving on a team lead by a former ONI Hitman

And they are introduced as being drinking buddies. Like, I'm sorry but it feels like such an obvious plot thread to pull on

[glossy sun]

How long do you think it took for the Banished to construct Chak Lok's tower

[carmine sleet]

Whenever I find my notes on the changes I'd make to Halo 5, I'm gonna add this to them, because honestly, it would make sense for Buck to be wary, regardless of Locke no longer being ONI

[carmine sleet]

Not that long, the Banished basically drop their buildings from their Dreadnoughts (As you see on Infinite's first mission)

[glossy sun]

That's what I thought
The tower looks like it's made from Dropbases just stacked

[tight badge]

When high charity was destroyed wasnt it a great day for the covenant IIRC
A new Halo ring was discovered and a San’Shyuum was born

[glossy sun]

That is correct

[twin parcel]

Yep, I've always liked Grey Team.

They're badass as hell.

I mean all SPARTAN-IIs are

But Grey Team in particular is picked by ONI for real classified deep ops behind enemy lines, committing war crimes on Sangheili worlds and causing chaos. Stuff that is straight up suicide missions.

I also like the whole thing about Sharquoi being put into Envoy.

Iirc Sharquoi were a concept enemy in Halo 2

[modest marsh]

they predate halo itself under the name Drinol

they're an offshoot of the marathon enemy called Drinniol

[vagrant ocean]

The only team more covert than Gray Team is Black.

[glossy sun]

My personal headconon is that in Reach the Firefight mode is you playing a random Spartan-III who is fighting wave on wave of Covenant forces so that you can take some of the pressure off for either NOBLE team or other forces

[stoic hamlet]

There were (as far as we know) six teams of specialist III’s (Gauntleted, Red, Echo, Noble, Strident, Anchor) so it’s possible.

We know at least Kevin-A282 fought on Reach, and seemingly lost his entire team (again).

[stoic hamlet]

meanwhile, the Spartan III’s :p

[twin parcel]

I mean yeah, but the IIIs were created by Col Ackerson and iirc the project wasn't under the Navy's or ONIs purview.

It was secretive as hell because of Ackerson being petty and hating Halsey

[twin parcel]

Black Team is also cool as hell, I've always liked Grey Teams dynamic and the whole fact of that they constantly tried to escape during training and that they more or less don't like the UNSC. They weren't easily "conditioned" like the others and maintained their rebellious attitude.

Envoy does a good job of showcasing their talents too, being able to come out of cryo and mount an effective defense and repel an enemy they more or less know nothing about (the Sharquoi) is pretty awesome. It did a good job of showcasing a SPARTANs ability to adapt to any situation, they aren't strictly stealth oriented and can smash skulls just as good as an assault specialist like Kelly.

It's a great read and I'd love to see a new Grey Team novel, they're absolute beasts.

[lavish seal]

Just finished Epitaph and starting Empty Throne. I’ve read/listened to all the books so far and find myself missing the style and feel of the earlier authors like Staten, Travis, Nylund and Denning.

Anyone else feel like the vibe of the books has shifted in the last 5-6 titles? Or is it just me?

Maybe I’m just the one changing as I get older.

[stoic hamlet]

It was under ONI Section III Beta-5, but it got most of its funding from the Army. Parangosky was the one who declared it ultra top secret. Ackerson in his internal monologue notes he detests the idea of secretive black ops stuff, and doesn’t agree with it but sees no choice but to go along with it.

[twin parcel]

Ahhhh, mb, it's been a while since I've read anything regarding SPARTAN IIIs

My brains internal storage is pretty much taken up by three different fandoms lore, gets spotty sometimes. 😂

[stoic hamlet]

All good!

If you were curious:

Colonel Ackerson ran both hands through his thinning hair, and poured himself a glass of water from the carafe on the table. His hand shook. Ironic that his career in the military had come to this: a secret meeting on a ship that technically didn't exist, about to discuss a project that, if successful, would never surface from the shadows.
Eyes-only classification. Code words. Double deals and back-stabbing. He longed for earlier days when he held a rifle in his hands, the enemy was easily recognized and dispatched, and Earth was the most powerful, secure center of the universe.
Those times only existed in memory now, and Ackerson had to live in the dark to save what little light remained.

…

Parangosky said, "You need a Spartan to train Spartans, of course, but"—her voice lowered—"tread damned lightly. This thing goes public, people find out we're making ‘disposable heroes,' and morale will plummet across the fleet. Make sure no one in Section Three knows about your SPARTAN-II trainer, or the SPARTAN-IIIs. They're going to have to vanish. Understood?"
”Yes, ma'am."
"And for God's sake," she said, narrowing her eyes to slits, "Catherine Halsey must never know. Her bleeding-heart sympathies for the Spartans have won her too many admirers at CENTCOM. If that woman wasn't so vital to the war we would have had her retired decades ago."

• Ghosts of Onyx, chapter 2

[orchid kettle]

That line's pretty funny in hindsight, what with Kilo-5 and all

[desert kettle]

I think this is a bit of a stupid question but it's for cosplay purposes.
When Spartans are out of their MJOLNIR suits, do we know what the issued clothing they're given looks like?

[orchid kettle]

In 4 they wear what appears to be the undersuit with pants and maybe boots

in Infinite the Spartan recruits just dress like normal soldiers, it appears

[desert kettle]

Gotcha, I see.
Do you happen to have images on hand? Or a place I could grab some pictures from?

[frigid heart]

I’d assume just BDUs

[orchid kettle]

https://www.halopedia.org/images/b/b0/H4-Concept-Undersuit-Male.jpg?906d9

https://www.halopedia.org/images/2/27/HInf_Spartan_Laurette_addressing_Spartans.png?acb06

[desert kettle]

Duly noted 🫡 thank you!

[stoic hamlet]

In Silent Storm/Ghosts of Onyx/The Fall of Reach they just wear grey fatigues with the Spartan patch.

[stoic hamlet]

Yeah, but a lot of stuff after Ghosts of Onyx especially around Reach and K-5 feels like blatant character assassination, so it’s not surprising.

[vagrant ocean]

K-5 is blatant character assassination. Particularly with Halsey.

[stoic hamlet]

Mendez as well.

[vagrant ocean]

Oh Mendez was all in on training the IIs, and the attempt to rehabilitate him is insane. He forced them to almost kill a squad of marines to get back to base or else be left to die.

The marines had weapons loaded with live ammunition.

Hell, on numerous occasions personnel responsible for training the Spartan-IIs ordered their subordinates to use live ammunition on CHILDREN, and I’m almost certain Mendez gave them the green light.

He’s just as guilty as Halsey, if not more.

[versed salmon]

We learn in Halo Outcasts that there are 2 surviving ||Precursors on Netherop||. Did they just sit there and watch as the Flood ravaged the galaxy during the Forerunner flood war and chill?

[empty bloom]

Real

[stoic hamlet]

They’ve moved beyond physical forms… ahd they’re broadly allied with the Flood anyways.

At least in ideals.

[versed salmon]

I thought the flood were a perversion of them? Regardless, aren't their actions contrary to the balance of Living Time and screwing things up?

[stoic hamlet]

The Flood are a perversion “sort of” but not really.

[vagrant ocean]

It’s just a group of Precursors that decided to be even more eldritch horrors.

[stoic hamlet]

It’s like you want to make a steak and cheese sandwich, but you make a steak and cheese wrap instead.

The ingredients are all technically there and it’s all technically correct but anyone who knows what they’re looking at can see it’s not actually what was intended.

But broadly speaking it’s “correct”.

[hardy swan]

guys are the ODSTs at the end of "We are ODST" named or just randoms

[vagrant ocean]

One is.

Tarkov

[stoic hamlet]

One might be Johnathan Doeherty.

[minor sky]

Is Saint's Testimony any good?

[obsidian thistle]

TECHNICALLY yes

They all had names

But we cannae read em

Based on the costumes getting around

@stoic hamlet

[burnt spear]

Can hunters throw it back?

[spiral compass]

So theirs a chance the flood can return along with the endless in the next Halo release?

[carmine sleet]

A chance based on what?

[modest marsh]

There’s always a chance for the flood to return because they’re an omnipresent threat that will always exist in some form

I doubt they’ll be a big part of the next halo campaign though

[thorn spindle]

no1 knows

[spiral compass]

Theirs flood containment facilities on zeta halo

[heady fjord]

you're stupid

[carmine sleet]

And nobody on Zeta is dumb enough to let the Flood out

Like, the UNSC don't want the mess with the Flood, same with the Banished

And I doubt the Endless want to touch it either

[spiral compass]

Doesn't have to be on purpose

[carmine sleet]

I never said on purpose

And like, having someone accidentally release the Flood has already happened multiple times now

[versed salmon]

Could be there’s an installation somewhere that’s been overrun by the flood for a while

[spiral compass]

Its already been confirmed that one of the installations monitors hasn't been communicating with the others for a long time so I believe you are correct

[spiral compass]

Its really not a big deal, we are all adults, just move past it

[versed salmon]

At this point we know literally nothing about the next release, so really anything is up for grabs. I would say to temper your expectations and hopes though, simply because it’s better to be pleasantly surprised rather than bitterly disappointed

[spiral compass]

Pretty much every Halo fan needed to hear and follow that since Pre-release Halo 4.

I believe that next one will be quite perfect though... the last 3 halos did an amazing job in different areas so I cant see the team doing any wrong with the next

[versed salmon]

I'm not trying to be a pessimist, but me personally I'm not at all excited for the October reveal. I'm too burnt out to care much, and I'm treating it as a "well we'll see". Not to crap on anyone's excitement. If you're excited, fantastic. If not, I share in the mehness

[spiral compass]

I think thats a reasonable experience

[versed salmon]

I know what I would hope for in the next mainline game, so if we get that, yay. If not, I hope at least the story is good (or what I'd find good at least)

[spiral compass]

as long as I could play it for 5 years without being bored lol

I honestly thought Halo Infinite was going to get the Rainbow Six Treatment of being constantly updated for 10plus years

[carmine sleet]

That was the Monitor of 05, who we know the fate of thanks to Halo 2

[spiral compass]

Oh yeah I forgot

[thorn spindle]

im a burnt out maybe next game person, my remaining halo excitement left is all for october 😱

[minor sky]

What was modern humanity's first contact with Forerunner tech?

[spark pivot]

Probably the spirit of fires crew

Or that one company

[stoic hamlet]

Onyx, as far as we know.

The meteor was discovered in 2474, but Onyx is the first indication of real Forerunner ruins, and saw the planet quarantined.

[vagrant ocean]

No one with a working brain stem is gonna let them out on purpose.

[vagrant ocean]

Probably earlier on Coral,

[obsidian thistle]

2007

As far as we are aware

Some alien conspiracy nuts somehow managed to get into Forerunner servers but they doubted their legitimately.

[stoic hamlet]

I don’t think so.

When they found out Onyx was full of Forerunner ruins the entire planet was erased from the records and no one was allowed to set up colonies.

Coral had no such removal of UEG colonizers.

And its ruins had to be excavated.

[obsidian thistle]

With Mendicant Bias (who hijacked a more localised Ancilla) talking to them

But yea 2007 technically

But seeing as not even the conspiracy nuts believed it

It kinda was a tiny blip of zero consequence

Funny how stuff worked out

There was a guy who went to places the earth stood still

And he directed us to a server at one spot

[vagrant ocean]

Lowkey I love how there’s still an Amazon listing for a fake book.

[obsidian thistle]

HEH

Good catch

I was hoping someone would know what I was talking about

[spiral compass]

You say that, but there were literally people who followed Jim Jones, and that's sad to say, but my point is its more realistic in story telling for a human cult to release the flood

[vagrant ocean]

Lowkey I think that if HS wanted to do something crazy they should make a real Castaway Theory book.

Especially since they like to dive into the more esoteric aspects of Halo lore.

[obsidian thistle]

Tbf this was the 2007 internet

Not 2025

A WAY different time

I was a wee loon back then. XD

[vagrant ocean]

People in 2025 are just as insane and stupid as people from 2007, probably even more so.

[spiral compass]

Every 20 years you see a repeat of human behavior with the same topics

Why do you think it's so hard for new fresh content to complete with recycled content

[vagrant ocean]

It’s not profitable.

[spiral compass]

Depends on which content and the consumers targeted for it

[minor sky]

Eh. I think the influx of social media designed to farm attention + out phones making the internet next to us at all times has made things a tad worse

[spark pivot]

no, it's just made it more obvious

humanity doesn't really change, our flaws just become more obvious with time and advancements

[placid iron]

I want to talk about the fallen Marines throughout Zeta Halo. I've found many, so I can analyze them and draw my own conclusions.

Last time I think I recorded it but I deleted it but at that time it was on a mountain with a marine with a sniper and several jackals and grunts it looked like the marine had fought until the end

[versed salmon]

Is Mendicant Bias dead?

[glossy sun]

I do not think so

He's still around I believe

[minor sky]

I disagree.

Maybe I'm not as much of a cynic as I usually prescribe myself to be

[burnt spear]

So we all agree humanity would’ve lost if the covenant didn’t fall apart right

[carmine sleet]

Yes

Humanity didn't win the war, they survived it

[vagrant ocean]

We don’t really know.

[twin parcel]

Average Human Marine without Powered Armor, Shields and extreme enhancements Vs a bunch of Hinge Heads and Birds

The Indomitable Human Spirit stands strong.

We were born to inherit the stars. (literally in the lore)

[empty bloom]

Found a user who doesn't understand the point of the Mantle of Responsibility.

(You are literally supposed to reject it out of principle)

[covert tide]

yes humanity could never have won the war against the covenant
we "won" by sheer luck, and by sheer luck I mean we simply ran out the clock
even if we had the Spartan IV's and even The UNSC Infinity we would'nt have fared much better.

[covert tide]

what is the point of being the parent to every other species in the galaxy to begin with????

[empty bloom]

Alright. Are you familiar with the concept of the White Man's Burden?

Just in case, I'll explain it anyways.

[frigid heart]

You just made my head explode
I never thought of it like that

[empty bloom]

At its core, both the Mantle and the WMB are both concepts of stating that as the 'most advanced' species, race, culture, et cetera, they must be in charge of everything for everyone out of societal duty.

In reality, it is an imperial decree that, if followed as intended, incurs a mandate of brutally knocking down anyone 'below' the chosen race/culture/species whenever they approach.

On those grounds, the purpose of the Mantle is to be rejected in favor of equity.

[empty bloom]

Most Halo fans don't, which explains why most Halo fans don't get Halo 4, 5, and Infinite's plot.

One of the chief moments in 5 is Master Chief's outright rejection of the concept of the Mantle as an Imperialist piece of rhetoric.

As the effective emblem of humanity's core facet, determination, Chief's rejection of the Mantle is meant as a stalwart rejection of a philosophical supremacist postiion.

[covert tide]

Speaking of Chief
It took me a while to realize this but y'all are fools when it comes to Legendary Halo 2
it's not broken, or Unfair........
It's BORDERLINE LORE ACCURATE.
minus the shields being tissue paper and jackal snipers

[empty bloom]

I mean, kinda, yeah?

At least in that regard

[covert tide]

i say borderline because to get the LORE Accurate difficulty of Halo you'd have to turn on The Skulls: Catch, Boom/Cowbell, Mythic, Iron, Famine, and finally IWHBYD because the covenant loves to trash talk/Taunt humans.
Source: https://youtube.com/shorts/T0B53CdXktc?si=1zn7GIub9IKldTAZ