I’ve just finished the Forerunner trilogy books, and two major questions press on my mind:
Why did the Forerunners opt to commit mass genocide, murder, and suicide with the Halo rings rather than follow the Didact’s plan to build shield worlds to combat the Flood? The latter plan seems much more reasonable.
How is it that the UrDidact wasn’t killed when the rings were fired, and why didn’t the Forerunners save themselves by hiding themselves in the same way the Didact was protected?
These just seem like gaping plot holes to me, but I could be wrong. Does anyone have an explanation?
It’s only sacrifice if you consider that every single forerunner lost willingly accepted the Master Builder’s plan to fire the rings. The book indicates that this is not the case, as seen by the fact that the Didact objected and had a number of followers. That’s to say nothing of the fact that they murdered all other sentient life.
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> I’ve just finished the Forerunner trilogy books, and two major questions press on my mind:
>
> 1) Why did the Forerunners opt to commit mass genocide, murder, and suicide with the Halo rings rather than follow the Didact’s plan to build shield worlds to combat the Flood? The latter plan seems much more reasonable.
>
> 2) How is it that the UrDidact wasn’t killed when the rings were fired, and why didn’t the Forerunners save themselves by hiding themselves in the same way the Didact was protected?
>
> These just seem like gaping plot holes to me, but I could be wrong. Does anyone have an explanation?
The Halo rings represented a last resort strategy to the Flood. However, the Shield Worlds were a much more sound and current plan, right? The other aspect to the approval of the Halos and degradation of the Warrior-Servants was… politics. The Builders are a bit greedy, both for their rate and for the species as a whole. The Halos would be an ultimate symbol of power, ensuring Builder dominance over the Ecumene and a firm tool that can suppress rebellion and conflict. We saw that when Faber used a Halo over Janjur Qom.
Unfortunate in the long run, but the political divides and issues of the Forerunners are a large cause for many parts of their weak handling of the war with the Flood. And it’s something that crafted the Forerunners into a believable and “living” civilization, in my opinion.
Requiem was one of the only fully complete Shield Worlds, refitted to protect occupants from the Halos’ effects. We don’t exactly know how, but Shield Worlds grant immunity from the Halo Array.
Their construction was halted when the Didact went into exile, but were restarted under the IsoDidact. They were planned to be used to protect Forerunners and other species when the Halos fired. However, a combination of low remaining time and constricted resources due to the war led to the vast majority being incomplete and unable to fulfil their purposes. Those that were complete were done so with so little time left that the Forerunners couldn’t occupy them. Rather, there weren’t really any Forerunners left. When the Capital fell to Mendicant Bias and Precursor artifacts wreaked havoc on Forerunner strongholds, they didn’t have much left. Most fled to the Greater Ark, which was destroyed. The rest were amassed by Offensive Bias in the final battle to hold off Mendicant as the Array fired.
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> It’s only sacrifice if you consider that every single forerunner lost willingly accepted the Master Builder’s plan to fire the rings. The book indicates that this is not the case, as seen by the fact that the Didact objected and had a number of followers. That’s to say nothing of the fact that they murdered all other sentient life.
I don’t remember for sure, but I believe the Didact’s Shield World plan was tried for awhile. There is lots of evidence of this in Ghosts of Onyx where a handful of Spartan-IIs, Spartan-IIIs, and Dr. Halsey end up inside a Forerunner shield world that was clearly supposed to house a Forerunner population, but never did.
Because the Forerunners were so weak from their war with Humanity and also somewhat corrupted by internal politics (the Builder v. Warrior battle that was eloquently explained above) and given the devastating speed and brutality of the Flood’s sweep across the galaxy, it was eventually decided that the Master Builder’s plan was the only solution. Think of it maybe like Russia losing a World War today, and in a last ditch effort, they fire off all their nukes to “go out with a bang,” except the Forerunners actually had a benevolent reason in mind–allowing life to grow again with the Flood eradicated.
The Didact survived in his cryptum inside of Requiem, which I think was a special shield world where he created his Prometheans. By the time the Array is fired, there is no hope for the Forerunners as a species. There are very, very few left outside those involved with the firing of the rings, so there really wasn’t anyone left to hide inside of other remaining Shield Worlds (if any), most of which had probably been overrun by the Flood anyway.
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> > 2533274892061674;1:
> > I’ve just finished the Forerunner trilogy books, and two major questions press on my mind:
> >
> > 1) Why did the Forerunners opt to commit mass genocide, murder, and suicide with the Halo rings rather than follow the Didact’s plan to build shield worlds to combat the Flood? The latter plan seems much more reasonable.
> >
> > 2) How is it that the UrDidact wasn’t killed when the rings were fired, and why didn’t the Forerunners save themselves by hiding themselves in the same way the Didact was protected?
> >
> > These just seem like gaping plot holes to me, but I could be wrong. Does anyone have an explanation?
>
>
> The Halo rings represented a last resort strategy to the Flood. However, the Shield Worlds were a much more sound and current plan, right? The other aspect to the approval of the Halos and degradation of the Warrior-Servants was… politics. The Builders are a bit greedy, both for their rate and for the species as a whole. The Halos would be an ultimate symbol of power, ensuring Builder dominance over the Ecumene and a firm tool that can suppress rebellion and conflict. We saw that when Faber used a Halo over Janjur Qom.
> Unfortunate in the long run, but the political divides and issues of the Forerunners are a large cause for many parts of their weak handling of the war with the Flood. And it’s something that crafted the Forerunners into a believable and “living” civilization, in my opinion.
>
> Requiem was one of the only fully complete Shield Worlds, refitted to protect occupants from the Halos’ effects. We don’t exactly know how, but Shield Worlds grant immunity from the Halo Array.
> Their construction was halted when the Didact went into exile, but were restarted under the IsoDidact. They were planned to be used to protect Forerunners and other species when the Halos fired. However, a combination of low remaining time and constricted resources due to the war led to the vast majority being incomplete and unable to fulfil their purposes. Those that were complete were done so with so little time left that the Forerunners couldn’t occupy them. Rather, there weren’t really any Forerunners left. When the Capital fell to Mendicant Bias and Precursor artifacts wreaked havoc on Forerunner strongholds, they didn’t have much left. Most fled to the Greater Ark, which was destroyed. The rest were amassed by Offensive Bias in the final battle to hold off Mendicant as the Array fired.
I think it’s like this. The builders had more influence in the decision. They proposed the Halos and they were chosen over the shield worlds.
One thing I never understood about the Halos is this. It wipes out all sentient and biological life right? Why didn’t wipe out all flood? Even if your on a halo you’d be affected by the blast right?
Well the Halo Arrays didn’t work because TADAH, the flood is still present.
But maybe the source of the flood is located somewhere in the observable universe. And last I checked, the halo array effects living organisms on a galactic scale, not a universal one.
But back to your questions
I don’t know, the whole thing just seems kind of pointless.
> Well the Halo Arrays didn’t work because TADAH, the flood is still present.
The Flood from the original trilogy remained because the Forerunners preserved specimens for study IIRC. If 343 Guilty Spark hadn’t been so incompetent, the forces that landed on Installation 04 never would have accidentally released them. The Halo Array definitely worked as intended.
The Flood in the original trilogy was just a small portion of what assaulted ancient humanity and the Forerunners, and it still was nearly enough to wipe out the UNSC and Sangheili working together. When the Flood comes back in one of the future games, I think it will be similar in scale and intensity to what we saw in the Forerunner trilogy.
This is why Humanity is being built up since the end of Halo 3, with the Spartan-IVs, Infinity, the Janus Key, etc. These developments give them a more realistic chance of surviving the Flood when it returns.
Dont forget that the locations of many of the completed Shield Worlds were extracted from Mendicant Bias by the Flood. Requiem and Onyx/Trevelyan may have been a few exceptions to the overarching rule.
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> I think it’s like this. The builders had more influence in the decision. They proposed the Halos and they were chosen over the shield worlds.
>
> One thing I never understood about the Halos is this. It wipes out all sentient and biological life right? Why didn’t wipe out all flood? Even if your on a halo you’d be affected by the blast right?
The Flood is wiped out by the Halos too.
This has been retconned since Cortana’s original statement about only killing the food source.
On the original Halos that fired horizontally, you could survive. But the new and current rings, yes. You’d be killed too if you were on them, I believe.
Relax. Bungie left a ton of holes. and really didn’t care to much in filling them. 343 is working hard to fill them the best they can. They even got halo 1-3 main writer back on board to help world build and fill holes. We’ll have all our answers by the time halo 6 is done