Which covenant ship can single handedly take over earth and how would the governments of the world respond?
Probably a small fleet would wipe us out with no ground deployment needed unless the covenant wanted something from the surface. The human race colonised a lot of worlds, the human population and resources grew on a massive scale and they still slowly fell to the covenant until the end of the war.
We simply lack resources, a few nukes could take out a few ships but we don’t have enough to take out all of them.
Covies invade Earth of right now?
We go extinct.
Any of the mainline battle cruisers ranging from the CCS-Battle Cruiser to the CAS-Assault Carriers would be more then enough individually to take our modern day Earth. Anything larger such as the CSO-Super Carrier or the smaller and more numerous CRS-Cruisers seen in the Post-War Era would be overkill in regards to the CSO and I’d say we stand a good chance against the CRS and possibly even the RCS-Armored Cruiser but that is a mere absumption since by the Human-Covenant War it was outdated and phased out by the superior CCS.
The reasoning behind why I chose the CCS or larger vessel in the Covenant Navy is because as we know. Glassing a very preferrable method of the Covenant when ground resistance is proving to be troublesome. Say what you will about Covenant Tech, but the worlds military would stand a fair chance when it comes to ground engagements. I also don’t see nukes entering the equation either seeing as how the collateral damage done to ourselves would give our world leaders pause as the threat of nucleur winter could become likely.
We could nuke a Lich, but anything bigger than that up to about a CCS will give us a bad day, and leave us in a nuclear winter, even if we take it out. Bigger than a CCS is probably an extinction level event. A CAS could likely tank Earth’s full nuclear arsenal and keep going given how hard it is for one of the Ark’s weapons to punch through one in Halo Wars 2.
Let me just direct you towards this video, in which the scenario of a single CCS battlecruiser attacks a modern day Earth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8shjYhQ5wdo
And another video in which there was a large scale invasion.
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> Let me just direct you towards this video, in which the scenario of a single CCS battlecruiser attacks a modern day Earth.
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8shjYhQ5wdoAnd another video in which there was a large scale invasion.
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAi6KMq0ll0
Jericho VII was glassed in 1 hour with 36 ships, mostly cruisers and destroyers. That was actually done, and was witnessed by Master Chief. That means the Reach data drop that claims otherwise was wrong, and the AI that compiled it did not have accurate information.
Meh. I prefer the retcon that it was more of a term to terrify humans into action rather than entire planets getting melted. Seems far more in scale with what the Covenant is able to do, and makes more sense in accordance to scale. I actually didn’t bother to watch the second video, I had seen the first a long time ago, the second one just popped up in the search results, so I included it since it seemed relevant.
Any Covenant ship with a ventral beam and a complement of seraphs could take out Earth with only a moderate amount of trouble imo. We might get lucky with a nuke strike, but that would only serve to maybe take down the shields, not destroy the ship. Even if the ventral beam only served to take out a moderate percentage of landmass, the environmental effects would potentially render Earth uninhabitable over time. Even if the environment could recover, the loss of resources like food and livable landmass could lead to societal collapse.
- We’re given a place within their ranks and society or within their Fringe; - We’re forcefully integrated; - We all die and Earth probably becomes inhabitable.
With the Long Night of Solace or High Charity, we wouldn’t stand a chance against the covenant.
We would have about 25% chance of surviving the devastation of a CCS-Class Battlecruiser.
Maybe a 75% chance of surviving a corvette attack.
We, i’ll get to see a needle super combo in real life.
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> - We’re given a place within their ranks and society or within their Fringe; - We’re forcefully integrated; - We all die and Earth probably becomes inhabitable.
Depending on whether the Covenant sees modern humanity in the same light as 26th century one (i.e a threat to the Great Journey), we most likely get option 2. Remember that the Prophets decision to wage an eradication war against humanity was an outlier to the Covenants usual modus operandi when encountering new alien species. So, if by chance of the current scenario we don’t get designated as Reclaimers, following a short but brutal war, we survive as a client race of the Covenant. The curious question here is where we would stand in the hierarchy: below Prophets and Elites to be sure, but what about the rest? IMO, we would land somewhere around the same social status as the Brutes had before the Schism: subservient to the ruling races, but above Grunts, Jackals, and Drones.
And if we do turn out as Reclaimers again…well, a single Corvette commanded by a half-competent Shipmaster should be enough to end us.
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> > 2533275010817669;10:
> > - We’re given a place within their ranks and society or within their Fringe; - We’re forcefully integrated; - We all die and Earth probably becomes inhabitable.
>
> Depending on whether the Covenant sees modern humanity in the same light as 26th century one (i.e a threat to the Great Journey), we most likely get option 2. Remember that the Prophets decision to wage an eradication war against humanity was an outlier to the Covenants usual modus operandi when encountering new alien species. So, if by chance of the current scenario we don’t get designated as Reclaimers, following a short but brutal war, we survive as a client race of the Covenant. The curious question here is where we would stand in the hierarchy: below Prophets and Elites to be sure, but what about the rest? IMO, we would land somewhere around the same social status as the Brutes had before the Schism: subservient to the ruling races, but above Grunts, Jackals, and Drones.
>
> And if we do turn out as Reclaimers again…well, a single Corvette commanded by a half-competent Shipmaster should be enough to end us.
We would need to prove our worth as species to be properly ranked. They won’t just place us at the same levels as the Jiralhanae for nothing right? 
Either way, we could always have the scenario 1, where we could be invited to join them, as it pretty much happened with every specie besides the Unggoy. If we’re proven to be combat inefficient, we’re just cast into their Fringe, as a client race, as you said.
Being Reclaimers is basically like throwing a coin to the air. The whole genocide is due to a mis-translation. When translation stuff about Humanity, the translator mis-translated a word, that being “Reclaimer” with the word “Reclaim”.
If we are Reclaimers and the translator translates the word correctly, we’d definitively be given a high place, perhaps with privileges that were otherwise exclusive to Sangheili, such as participating in the Council, building and commanding ships, etc. If mis-translated, then it’s scenario 3.
we’d go extinct. Of course then again if the rumors are true about the governments of the Earth having a secret space fleet then we all might have Grunt pets.
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> > 2533274870884222;13:
> > > 2533275010817669;10:
> > > - We’re given a place within their ranks and society or within their Fringe; - We’re forcefully integrated; - We all die and Earth probably becomes inhabitable.
> >
> > Depending on whether the Covenant sees modern humanity in the same light as 26th century one (i.e a threat to the Great Journey), we most likely get option 2. Remember that the Prophets decision to wage an eradication war against humanity was an outlier to the Covenants usual modus operandi when encountering new alien species. So, if by chance of the current scenario we don’t get designated as Reclaimers, following a short but brutal war, we survive as a client race of the Covenant. The curious question here is where we would stand in the hierarchy: below Prophets and Elites to be sure, but what about the rest? IMO, we would land somewhere around the same social status as the Brutes had before the Schism: subservient to the ruling races, but above Grunts, Jackals, and Drones.
> >
> > And if we do turn out as Reclaimers again…well, a single Corvette commanded by a half-competent Shipmaster should be enough to end us.
>
> We would need to prove our worth as species to be properly ranked. They won’t just place us at the same levels as the Jiralhanae for nothing right?
>
> Either way, we could always have the scenario 1, where we could be invited to join them, as it pretty much happened with every specie besides the Unggoy. If we’re proven to be combat inefficient, we’re just cast into their Fringe, as a client race, as you said.
>
> Being Reclaimers is basically like throwing a coin to the air. The whole genocide is due to a mis-translation. When translation stuff about Humanity, the translator mis-translated a word, that being “Reclaimer” with the word “Reclaim”.
> If we are Reclaimers and the translator translates the word correctly, we’d definitively be given a high place, perhaps with privileges that were otherwise exclusive to Sangheili, such as participating in the Council, building and commanding ships, etc. If mis-translated, then it’s scenario 3.
I don’t think any scenario where humanity is designated as Reclaimers ends well for us. That would mean humanity would, by the virtue of the Covenant’s own religion, be deemed above the Prophets. In no way would the Hiararchs let that fly, so we burn.
As for the other point, I think we would be able to prove are value as capable combatants fairly quickly after we are integrated in the Covenant’s society. There is a reason i singled out the Jiralhanae as benchmark for where we could stand. Similarly to us, they’ve had a very turbulent and conflict rich history that has makes them ideal for implementation as shock troops. Granted, we haven’t (yet) nuked ourselves back into the stoneage as they did, but even so I think we would end up being evaluated at roughly the same level. The Sangheili would still hate our guts though 
(something something “dishonorable beast” something something).
We’d be gone within a few days. Humanity 500 years in the future was barely able to withstand the Covies.
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> We’d be gone within a few days. Humanity 500 years in the future was barely able to withstand the Covies.
Perhaps, but I’d like to think with the mass military’s the US has and the tech that we’re moving towards we could in the next few years create some planetary defenses if we had to. Like if we knew they were coming…
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> > 2533274887841772;17:
> > We’d be gone within a few days. Humanity 500 years in the future was barely able to withstand the Covies.
>
> Perhaps, but I’d like to think with the mass military’s the US has and the tech that we’re moving towards we could in the next few years create some planetary defenses if we had to. Like if we knew they were coming…
It’s hilarious that you think whatever primitive crap we throw up there within the next 20 years can survive more than 5…nay 1 minute.