Hard Light Productions Forums
General FreeSpace => FreeSpace Discussion => Topic started by: Snail on August 10, 2006, 08:08:52 am
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Which Shivan theory do you believe to be the 'correct' or most plausible one, or the one that you just like the most.
The Shivan Manifesto
The Shivans are energy beings and wish to stop all races from using subspace, as every jump causes a tear in subspace's skin, slowly but surely destroying it. They captured Bosch simply because they thought there were captive Shivans aboard the Iceni. They also feared that there was a fleet of Colossus juggernauts, and created a massive subspace portal to run away from the GTVA. Their home is 'Cocytus,' a hive set inside subspace.
The MindGames Theory
The Shivans are a race that is being controlled by a more intelligent and powerful race called the 'Starborn'. Shivans are there to destroy all those civilizations that become to powerful. They are also part of the 'show' called the 'Great Game.' Bosch was under the control of the Starborn, who made him contact the Shivans and tell them valuable information about the GTVA. However, the Shivans are now aware that the Starborn are controlling them and attempt to destroy the Capella star, killing all the Starborn on (in?) it.
The Reciprocity Theory
The Shivans are fighting against another race, the Nightmares. Both have been fighting for such a long time that they have forgotten everything and are just killing machines. They destroyed Vasuda Prime because there was a Nightmare vessel hidden, and were on their way not to Earth, but to Mars, as there was also another Nightmare vessel there aswell.
Mad Bomber's Theory
Shivans are sensitive to massive subspace disturbances, they had destroyed the Ancients because of their use of Knossos portals. 8,000 years later, the Vasudans and Terrans had collapsed the already-unstable Talania Jump Nodes, attracting the Shivans. The Shivans then came to investigate when they ran into the Vasudans and Terrans.
Ngtm1r's Theory
Conflict draws in the Shivans. The Shivans killed off the Ancients because they were fighting other races. The reason they had not come sooner was because the other civilizations the Ancients killed was because they couldn't put up a fight. But there was one that fought reasonably well, which drew in the Shivans. The Shivans, 8,000 years later, find two new species fighting each other. They attempt to wipe them out but fail. 32 years later, the NTF insurgency breaks out. The Shivans want to stop the conflict and so want to destroy the NTF. They first encounter the NTC Trinity, which opened fire on them. This angers the Shivans, and they want to kill of the NTF. They send the SC Rakshasa to have a look around. However, they encounter the Vigilant, and thinking it is a NTF ship, open fire on it. The GTVA then throws out the Carthage and Dashor, destroying the Rakshasa. Shivan forces deploy the Ravana, but it is destroyed quickly. Next, the GTVA push forward once again, and a Vasudan patrol attacks a number of Gas Miners. The Sathanas then arrives and annhialates the Vasudan force. However, the Sathanas is destroyed by the Colossus, forcing the Shivans to deploy the Sathani fleet. However, one Terran ship is attempting to communicate with them. They agree to communicate with Bosch. However, a panicked crew member shot the Shivan bording party, triggering the masacre. After Bosch boards the transport, the Vasudans arrive and destroy the second Azrael. With the communications with Bosch, the Shivans learn of their mistake of destroying the Vigilant. Instead of fighting the GTVA, the Shivans wish to make a sign that they are, "Bigger, meaner and that we will kick your ass." They do this by blowing up the Capella star.
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I voted mindgames, it seems to answer the "part of a bigger problem" and is very clever as to why the Shivans did what they did when the destroyed Capella.
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Mad bomber, Its fits everything shown in the game and fits near enough with my view.... :yes:
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Can't say I know much about Madbombers theory, but from what Snail says here, it doesn't explain the hint at the Shivans being "part of a bigger problem"?
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It could just be mans take on life and existance, IE lifes **** thewn you die, oh look shivans part of the bigger problem mentioned in the previous statement.
CD's theory on shivans ^^
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Technically, that'd be the old Reciprocity theory. I think the last Nightmare history 'script' stretched to 10 pages+, including stuff like the Progenitor derelict, etc.
Albiet the Nightmares / Shivans were always xenophobic in Reci canon; although there were various other objectives and concerns for them, fundamentally they are/were just evil ****s, and the idea was that there's always somebody out there whose bigger and badder, and you can either get squashed by them or slip out between their toes. (there's also a philosophical question as to what side to take, when you have 2 enemies threatening you and your only hope is to play them against each other and try and force a balance that you're really too weak to have a hope of enforcing; one of the latter Reci scripts dealt with the moral dilemma of 'releasing' the Shivans into GTVA space so they could fight the Nightmares and temporarily ease the pressure on the GTVA)
I was never entirely happy with the Nightmare concept, though, it started off as too much of a visual 'concept' inserted into the existing story*, rather than something the storyline was built around.
*the original - very first - Reciprocity story was literally about revenge, namely upon a sort of ex-NTF / mad scientist type who'd created his own fleet of Terran-Shivan hybrids - to create his own private fiefdom - including avenging the poor-bastard POWs converted to hybrid TS pilots. Then I came up with this concept of jet black fighters as said - but not shown - in the FS1 intro cutscene, etc etc, and ended up with various forms of ancient pan-galactic war.
EDIt; worth noting; I'm pretty sure Nicos' OtT campaign (aborted, sniff) came up with the 'saving subspace' story before the Shivan Manifesto came about.
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:( Where is ShivanBBQ Theory?
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And the Shivan Trailer Theory, and the Deus Ex Machina theory. I didn't want to include the funny ones OR the Snuffleupagus option cause everyone would choose that. ::)
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Mad bomber, Its fits everything shown in the game and fits near enough with my view.... :yes:
I haven't seen the whole theory but nothing in that blurb is actually contradictory to the MG theory. The Shivans in MG are attracted to subspace disturbances there too. It just that when you take a step back you see that the Starborn are the reason why they are attracted. :)
That said I consider MG to be a seperate universe from FS2 (In the same way something like Neo-Terra Victorious is). In this universe the Starborn exist. I'd never try using them to explain an occurance in a general discussion using them cause it's very doubtful that the Starborn are even remotely close to the explaination :v: had in mind when they wrote Freespace :)
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I have just now seen this topic... and to be honest it... isn't a good thing.
The purpose of me putting those theories on the wiki was to inspire people to come up with their own theories, not "join" any of them... I guess I should have put that on there. :doubt:
Don't suppose you could add a "my own personal theory" choice?
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I was going to put "Other," but of course everybody would check that and state their opinion. This isn't supposed to encourage people to 'join' any of these theories, it was just to see which was the most popular of the ones already out there. :)
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The question is which do you support, not which do you believe is or should be canon, of course we all have our own theories, but we can also appreciate other's theories too! :D
Yeah! what snail said before I got here! ;)
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I think I figured out how organized religion started.
The problem is... this was the concern about putting those theories on the wiki, even with the {{non-canon}} tag, the wiki looks much more official than other sources (such as the forum). I'm beginning to suspect that the wrong decision was the one that won over on that one.
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How does that line in "Life of Brian" go again? Follow the gourd, no we must gather shoes! Something like that?
:lol:
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I have just now seen this topic... and to be honest it... isn't a good thing.
The purpose of me putting those theories on the wiki was to inspire people to come up with their own theories, not "join" any of them... I guess I should have put that on there. :doubt:
Don't suppose you could add a "my own personal theory" choice?
This is exactly why i was against putting fanon in the wiki... people can use their own imaginations, all they need is the known facts to come up with a theory.
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Errr... I see something bad about to start here. :nervous:
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Nah, we've done this before. For quite a long period of time :D
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:yes2::yes:
It's a butterfly.
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Or a facehugger.......
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I didn't like that we put the Shivan Manifesto (a name which I am beginning to hate with a passion) on the wiki, I figured balance was needed... but I think that if it was just the Manifesto hidden in some dark corner of the wiki it would be better.
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I don't really like the Manifesto. It makes the Shivans look like cowards when they talk about a Colossus fleet. Besides, the Sath fleet could wipe out the Colossus fleet if they were quick. And the whole thing about the Shivans using a special warp engine was like saying hippies use vegetable oil for their cars.
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:yes2::yes:
It's a butterfly.
Its a facehugger........ :nod:
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I don't really like the Manifesto. It makes the Shivans look like cowards when they talk about a Colossus fleet. Besides, the Sath fleet could wipe out the Colossus fleet if they were quick. And the whole thing about the Shivans using a special warp engine was like saying hippies use vegetable oil for their cars.
Well, there's a vast criticisms page about the SM already; http://hard-light.net/wiki/index.php?title=Criticisms_of_the_Shivan_Manifesto
(I wrote a big chunk of it, albeit not intentionally for the wiki)
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I lean toward Nghtm1r's theory (not the theory involving the Nightmares, but our fellow HLP member Nghtm1r's theory.)
It is almost word for word what I thought, though I hadn't considered that whole bit about the NTF. I know it doesn't really answer the "part of bigger problem" bit, but with FS3 pretty well never coming, I've givin up on learning the big secret.
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They all kind of suck, to be honest. :p I like the Mad Bomber one the best, but unlike the others it doesn't explain much.
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Yay! People seem to think my theory sucks the least! :D
Although, for clarification, I had the Lost Fleet of 2328 serving as the trigger that attracted the Shivans, not the collapse of the two Talania nodes. Having a node get so overloaded with ships that it starts barfing them across spacetime is bound to elicit a few 'WTF' moments among those who detected it.
The event in question was first referenced in the campaign 'Awakenings', in which the GTD's Iowa and Moscow appear without warning in the Vasuda system, minus crew, after an unexplained 10-year absence. But despite basing it on something that isn't canon, there is a somewhat canon basis for my theory.
It wasn't until the Gamma Drac Knossos was opened that the Shivans really took notice of the GTVA in FS2. For that matter, the Ancients would have had to have lasted long enough to construct at least the one Knossos portal without construction being interrupted. If the Ancient cutscenes are anything to go by, they had conquered much of the galaxy by that point. As of 2367 the GTVA barely controls 30 systems (and three are in rebellion, too), so I think it's doubtful that Shivans somehow keep an eye on all subspace activity. The Ancients would have been trading and conquering and moving about far more than the comparably puny GTVA.
So that, in my view, tends to disprove the 'Shivans are attracted to normal subspace use' theory. If they were, they would have vaporized the Ancients' empire long before there was any chance to know enough about subspace to build Knossoi.
Ngtm1r's theory is a good one, too, and I think there is a good deal of truth in it (particularly the part about them not being able to tell an NTF ship from a GTVA one until Bosch explained what the heck was going on). But I doubt that they're attracted to conflict, per se. For all we know, the Lucifer could have happened upon us by chance, or by detecting some sort of massive subspace screw-up (an accident such as the one I mentioned earlier, or possibly a node collapsing earlier than the Shivans had expected, and going to see what the problem was). Or for that matter, the FS1 Shivans could have been lured towards T-V space by GTI operatives as part of the early stages of planning their coup. We just don't know enough.
None of the other theories (MG, Reci, Manifesto) have enough basis in canon IMO:
* MG quite frankly has no canon-ness (which is not to say that it's a bad plotline, quite the opposite ;)).
* The Nightmares are, of course, not a canon creation, but they would fit the bill of being "part of a bigger problem". I don't think the Reci theory is wrong at all, after all the Shivans did feel they need to have dozens of juggernaughts. But there isn't enough canon evidence for me to openly support it either. That's just me though.
* And the Manifesto... eh. I just can't picture the Shivans being irrationally scared of the GTVA's hypothetical horde of Colossi. Plenty of people have poked other holes in the Manifesto by now, there's no need for me to, really. It's perforated already. :P
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Apparently I'm the only person here who subscribes to the Reciprocity Theory. I think that's because it falls in line with my own theory.
My theory:
http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php/topic,41400.0.html (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php/topic,41400.0.html)
It's still a little rough, and it's split over a couple of posts, but here it is, if you're interested.
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Yeah, mine is a little misquoted here...
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It it? I thought I copied it word for word.
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Not really. You kinda missed my point about the NTF.
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* The Nightmares are, of course, not a canon creation, but they would fit the bill of being "part of a bigger problem". I don't think the Reci theory is wrong at all, after all the Shivans did feel they need to have dozens of juggernaughts. But there isn't enough canon evidence for me to openly support it either. That's just me though.
I'd hope the Reci theory is wrong, actually; it was never supposed to be 'right', just a spin off into my own ideas, and one thats been altered countless times to boot. That's why I like the MG concept; I don't think there's an ounce of chance Volition had the same idea, but it's simply a brilliantly original concept.
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* The Nightmares are, of course, not a canon creation, but they would fit the bill of being "part of a bigger problem". I don't think the Reci theory is wrong at all, after all the Shivans did feel they need to have dozens of juggernaughts. But there isn't enough canon evidence for me to openly support it either. That's just me though.
I'd hope the Reci theory is wrong, actually; it was never supposed to be 'right', just a spin off into my own ideas, and one thats been altered countless times to boot. That's why I like the MG concept; I don't think there's an ounce of chance Volition had the same idea, but it's simply a brilliantly original concept.
And that's why I support too! A brilliantly original concept!!
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I never got the whole 'Lost Fleet of 2328' thing after playing through Awakenings twice (maybe I'm just stupid... :blah: ).
I like the MG theory because it answers most of the anomalies, even if it definately isn't the one :v: thought up. It just seems like a very-well thought out theory. :nod: