[Koth]

Preservation through destruction.

That doesn't mean that I have to like that. And who the Terrans have actually destroyed apart from themselves a bit?

[Ransom]

I'm not asking you to like it. I was just clarifying my point.

[Koth]

What are we actually arguing about? I have my opinion you have yours.

[ShadowGorrath]

Spoiler:

Both sides - Vishnans and Shivans were looking for a race strong enough for something - that has enough potential of what they need . Ancients didn't have enough potential so they were destroyed to make way for a new race that might have that potential . So there came the Terrans and Vasudans . But they didn't have enough potential , so the Shivans had to destroy them .

[Koth]

Spoiler:

Well we were more talking about the preserving 'function' of the Shivans in the canon Freespace universe not the Blue Planet campaign which because it is a user made campaign can use any theories, plot devices, ideas etc. it wants to use so it is irrelevant for that debate.

[ShadowGorrath]

If you think about it - you're kind of right . But it can be used in FS2 anyway , because if the Shivan are preservers , and there is a bigger problem that the shivans are the symptom of , they might be looking for someone with enough potential .

[G0atmaster]

I did and I also know that the Shivans by eliminating the Ancients enabled the survival of the Terran and Vasudan species. But why are the Shivans then fighting against Terrans and Vasudans? Its not that there are any lesser Races around that have to be preserved. Perhaps they preserved Terrans and Vasudan from themselves? But if that's true wouldn't there have been an easier way to do this instead of trying to destroy Earth or blowing up Capella? Sometimes I get the feeling that Volition never had any real ideas of how to end the Freespace series and included the supernova because it was 'cool'.

In answering this, the Shivans weren't preserving the Terrans or Vasudans from themselves.  They were ensuring the survival of another race that would show up about 300,000 years in the future or so.  The T/V races had grown so much, like the ancients, and were continuing to expand.  The only difference I see between the Terrans, Vasudans and the Ancients, is that the Shivans showed up when the Terrand and Vasudans were in the process of obliterating one another, causing them to band together.  Whereas with the Ancients, they were so big and indomitable, they anhilated any and every other race they rubbed elbows with. 

My own personal speculation as to the story which got interrupted, is that the T's and V's would learn from the Ancients' mistakes, and show the Shivans that they didn't need to destroy the current intergalactic superpower to level the playing field for all the up-and-coming species competing with them.  I would think that the Terrans and Vasudans would realize, upon successfully allying with one another, they would do so with other races they come across, thus nullifying the need for the Shivans altogether.  Sorta like, today we have hundreds of nations, which in the FS universe, ultimately merged into the GTA.  I believe that no species that's come before (and been destroyed by the Shivans) knew how to unite this way BETWEEN species, the way the Terrans and Vasudans had to in order to survive the Shivan onslaught.  The game talks about the Ancients having enslaved other races, but never allying with anyone mutually as in the case of the GTVA.  See where I'm going with this?

[Goober5000]

I'll just go ahead and quote that cinematic, shall I?

Eh, that's kind of speculation (in-universe speculation, but speculation nonetheless).  It's interesting commentary; it might even be endorsed by Volition, but I don't think it's meant to be taken as set-in-stone canon.

The FS1 epilogue says that "the Shivans can rebuild [collapsed jump nodes]"; the FS2 epilogue by Petrarch says that "perhaps they are ... searching for a way back home"; but they're statements by characters, not statements by the developers.

[Mustang19]

Then what would the point of them be? I'm almost certain that they're meant as storyline freebies, rather than Petrarch spouting random crap.

Especially,

The FS1 epilogue says that "the Shivans can rebuild [collapsed jump nodes]"

The Shivans can rebuild them, not may be able to rebuild them. If that's not canon, then what is?

None of this has meaning if you're just trying to justify your campaign, as you can take as canon whatever you want given how contradictory the FS story can be at times. But IMO Volition intended that everything Petrarch and the FS1 epilogue said (for example) to be taken as fact.

Going back to the T/V discussion, like Goat I always thought that the Vasudans are the latest incarnation of the Ancients, but instead of the cycle of destruction and rebirth being completed normally in FS1, the Terrans intervened and prevented the Shivans from wiping out the Vasudans. And yes, like the rest of FreeSpace this is a human-centric theory. It was the Terrans that broke the cycle, not so much the teamwork between the two races.

[Darius]

Thanks for the fixes Flaming Sword!  I'll put them into the update right away.

And thanks everyone for the comments and criticisms so far, it's helping me to refine the storyline a little, and giving me an idea of what people are into in the next release.

[Flaming_Sword]

Oh, I almost forgot. The missing LODs I posted the errors for (which I left alone in the table fix) are just the original with a slightly different name and smaller size, probably shouldn't be too hard to do with something like imagemagick if you can get something that converts between dds and another format, if you feel like trying to fix it.

[NGTM-1R]

The ending was a big twist...a little too big. Too many leaps of faith are required. The GTVA would be at war with itself within the week in that situation. It would be like the NTF rebellion all over again, only worse; this is a cause even a rational person can get into.

And I really doubt the Vasudans would countenance such an action.

All in all, I have to say that on some levels I was left very disappointed. The mission design is excellent, but as always seems to be the case with fiction the most grevious sins one can commit are those of plot. Too much must be taken on faith; too much is presented in too short a space of time. Major events are not handled well; there is much too little time spent on them, much too little comment. They are accepted too easily.

[chinaman]

    awesome, I just finished the entire campaign and it was awesome. The music was great and I wish you will release the release  the sequel soon.

[Darius]

Unfortunately though I could have spent more time on background exposition which would possibly make the ending a bit more plausible, the campaign was dragging on a bit and I was running out of steam. That was when I made the choice to release a complete story now and try to shore up the plotline in subsequent releases.

Not the best option, since I was hoping to avoid a George Lucas-ish storyline (where the bulk of information is implied off-screen, leaving what is actually on-screen as inferior), but hopefully one that can be made up for later on.

[Snail]

Now that I'm finished, I'm going to go back and read all those spoiler posts...

[lostllama]

Darius, I take my proverbial hat off to you sir. This totally rocks bells.

A campaign which includes characters with depth...something you don't see in any of the original FS1 and FS2 campaigns, it helps create an atmosphere. Definitely looking forward to the next chapter.

Good stuff!!

[AqueousShadow]

I've still been trying to get through all of those Red-Alert missions. Snail was gracious enough to try to garner some attention towards them, but my problems remains unsolved.

Darius, you included a pack that made them all normal missions, but it looks like you didn't replace all of the red-alert missions. Even with the replacements, I've run into another red-alert. I believe it's the 4th of the "Journey" set.

@Snail What's the patch you are using to fix the red-alerts? I've gotten the normal map build, but the red-alerts still crash on me.

[NGTM-1R]

Update your version of FSO, I suspect...

[AqueousShadow]

To what?

I've gotten the normal map build, but the red-alerts still crash on me.

[Snail]

Create a new pilot. Don't do what I did, which was change to a different build and then start alternating between them. It corrupted my main player file.