[Black Wolf]

OK. So the Shivans have been around 8000 years. As far as we know (and I _strongly_ believe this was [V]'s intention) they have been using at least 1 ship class for that entire time (The Lucifer). Now, that ship class has (presumably) had beams (or extremely beam like structures that are rendered exactly as beams in the intro cutscene for FS2) for all of those 8000 years. So the question is - why didn't the Shivan ships have beams in the great war?

The way I see it, there are two possible reasons:

1) They had beam equipped ships but, for whatever reason, chose not to use them in the Great War.

2) They developed/fit them to their ships, much as the GTVA did, in the 32 years between FS1 and FS2

Now, the problem is, there are logical problems wth both those ideas. For the first part, it's ridiculous to go to war with anyone using less than your best weapons, no matter what your aim is (ie. whether you're a cosmic destroyer, a galactic immune system, or just an angry, xenophobic alien bug). Beam equipped cruisers would have ripped through GTA/PVN capital ships of any stripe (Hell, Liliths can still rip through GTVA caps, if you get them in the right spots). So that doesn't seem logical.

The other possibility, that they developed (from original yellow Lucy planet killing specs down to standard red anti cap beams)and equipped them in 32 years faces the same problems as the first one (ie. they've had them for 8000 years (on the lucy) but only felt the need to equip them now?) as well as a few of its own. The cain, for example, is vastly more powerful than before, and thus is presumably generating much more power. Why was it generating all this power before beams? Or did the Shivans replace the reactor (the heart of any ship) as well, rather than just building a new, beam optimised ship (which would probably have been easier, given the amount of rewiring (or whatever) you'd probably need to do to to convert plasma turrets to beams.

Put simply, I can't think up a good, solid reason, as to why, in the GTVAs mind, there were no beam equipped Shivan ships (other than the Lucifer) in the Great War. I realize, of course, why there were in a real world sense (That FS1's engine couldn't support them, and FS2s could (probably at least partially as little more than a slightly gimmicky, but still cool, selling point)). For the record, I'm doing up some campaign backstory and I always like to write that sort of stuff from the GTVA's perspective, mistakes and misconceptions included. But this one has me stumped.

[Ghost]

My theory is that the Shivans were testing us as they destroyed us. They went into battle on approximately equal footing, save for their shields and stronger weaponry and our inability to target them, and when we still proved enough of a match to adapt and destroy their ships... they brought in the Lucifer to put an end to that foolishness.

[psycho_fergo]

hmm, you have a very good point there...

i would say something along the lines of...the shivens had that technology, but it was only still in a kind of "test phase"...this can also fit with a fact of previouse descutions of the lucifer on its way home from destroying some other race..and had not actualy had any contact with the main shivan "worlds" or whatever they call home. thus meaning thier out dated weapon systems were still old and they didnt know any better...being shivans and all..

but also, the whole..not using them cause they dont want to..mightfall into the xenophobic side of things.....why send one sathanas at us when they could have sent like a million first off....saves some problems there...we would have no hope...

why does it always seem they are only testing us...they send something small..but considerable...we step up..and take em down..so they go..ok...take this then...

the same could have been like this before...in the great war...just pushing us to our limits making us struggle but know we can do nothing to stop them..perhaps it was a kind of sadistic way of xeno-tourture...hee hee

if you were going to anihilate something for all time..wouldnt you want to have soem fun? and maybe even they have some other "programming" put into thier being...as to only push the races to thier limits as to try and make it fair...or something..u can go off with that if you like..

or even a kind of...they are trying to find an allie worthy of being a fellow destroyer...they push a speicies to its breaking point..if it can then step up and show the shivens what they got....they might leave them alone..

after a while, they will come back and push them even further...throwing new challenges at them...then when they either are destroyed or step up to the challenge again....they leave them alone..and the process continues....maybe even the possability of a replacment "destroyer" speicies..but in this case..they may have bitten off more than they could chew...catching 2 races fuse together and thus changing circumstances for the shivens....

anyway..u people can take out whatever you like from that...thats just my couple of bucks...

[Unknown Target]

Maybe it's a plot hole? I was going to say that it was experimental tech, but the Ancients (which lived thousands of years ago) said that they encountered the shield system and found it's weakness, which rules out that theory.

[psycho_fergo]

Originally posted by Ghost
My theory is that the Shivans were testing us as they destroyed us. They went into battle on approximately equal footing, save for their shields and stronger weaponry and our inability to target them, and when we still proved enough of a match to adapt and destroy their ships... they brought in the Lucifer to put an end to that foolishness.

oh damn..i knew someone would jump the thread before i finnished writting..hee hee...great minds think alike ghost

[Nuclear1]

Maybe comps back in 1998 simply couldn't handle big fancy beam weapons firing every-which-way [/cynical]

But in all seriousness, the Shivan fleet in FS1 could have simply been a branch fleet, and only the Lucifer was beam-equipped.  The Cains, Lliths, and Demons could have been defunct by Shivan standards, for all we know, and they still punched holes in GTA and PVN lines.  When the GTA and PVN destroyed the Lucifer, that could have been a signal to the Shivans that they needed to get serious, and then they send in beam-equipped cruisers/caps/Saths.

However, I still stand by my first answer.

[WeatherOp]

Or maybe it was some kind of evil plan, for us to beat them in FS1, and then in FS2, as they tricked us into finding out things like the Knossos to rebuild it somewhere else.:devil:

[psycho_fergo]

or maybe they are really like our mothers and when were being bad like in a fight with the vasudans...or other humans(NTF) they come and spank us a bit

[Cobra]

game-development-wise, fs1 didn't have the rendering capabilities needed to make proper beams.

game-wise, i'm thinking that the Shivans found us so inferior that they decided not to use their beams on us. (aside from using them on planets)

[Roanoke]

Amazing how after all these years people still debate the big FS1->FS2 plot holes.....

[psycho_fergo]

hey, who can blame us...perhaps if the damn people made a FS3 maybe they could fix these plot holes for us....save us the trouble..but thats not gonna happen..so we just have to descuss this stuff

[Cobra]

he said the magic letters! run for your lives!!

(better not say that again, fergo, else you piss off more people than you will ever know)

[karajorma]

Originally posted by Cobra
game-development-wise, fs1 didn't have the rendering capabilities needed to make proper beams.

I don't buy that argument. gave the Lucifer pseudo-beams in FS1. They could as easily have given all the other shivan caps the same weapons if they had wanted to.

I don't have too much of a problem with beams. Maybe the Lucifer was only recently fitted with beams and sent on a shakedown genocide in FS1.

There is no evidence that the shivans had beams when they killed the ancients. Beams could be as new to the shivans as they are to the terrans.


What bugs me is why the lucifers shielding system was never seen again and even that can be explained away if we assume that beams can penetrate it and that beams are new.

[Cobra]

maybe it took the Shivans 20 years to make the shield system?

but yeah you present a good point there.

[Flipside]

The thing is, if they didn't have beams in FS1, why wasn't either command or your wingmates surprised when they had them when they first appeared in 2?

[Cobra]

probably because we had beams too.

[Flipside]

Exactly! There was even a chat about it mentioning that the Terrans had no Flak cannon and no Beams during the great war. So why, when the Shivans reappeared, also armed with Beam weapons, didn't one single person go 'Huh? Where'd they get Beam weapons from?'

[Cobra]

ask the developers then.

[Hippo]

My opinion, is that the shivans 'knew' (I use this term lightly because of the anthropromorphic fallacy) that their enemies would discover some part of their technology, ie; shields. They may have 'chosen' to not uotfit beams on every ship at the time bar the lucifer, even though they were probably certian they would win, because that technology could still be uncovered by their enemy, and unearthed many millenia later (ie; the records on altair) and used against them. however, the Shivans 'felt' safe using them on the Lucifer, as it was 'indestructable' as far as they knew. But lo and behold, we got close scans of the lucifer, destroyed it, and learned at least something from the technology (even though we didn't actually have a chunk of the lucifer). Once the shivans realised that the secret was out, (possibly by monitoring the node in gama drac, and seeing other beams in the GTVA/NTF confrontation) they let loose. Presumeably, witht e exceptions of the Lilith, Cain, and Demon, the other ships are 'new' in FS2, so migh thave been fittet the entire time with beam technology, but kept away from the front lines to prevent this technology from being discovered (again, with the exception of the lucifer).

As for why the GTVA didn't say, "Oh crap, they have beams too", look at hallfight and all the testing the GTI did on shivans AFTER the great war... They could have realised that the shivans had this type of phenomenon in them that makes bright things put holes in stuff, and figure that it was just a part of their species. After all, while many people thought they might (a la FS1 end monologue), noone actually wanted so say, "Hey! Lets see if the Shivans come back and kick our assess even worse with bigger ships!" The end.

[Nuclear1]

Originally posted by Flipside
Exactly! There was even a chat about it mentioning that the Terrans had no Flak cannon and no Beams during the great war. So why, when the Shivans reappeared, also armed with Beam weapons, didn't one single person go 'Huh? Where'd they get Beam weapons from?'

My thoughts on this come from the 2335 Rebellion (Silent Threat), where the Hades, having been based off of Lucifer and Shivan technology, had beam cannons similar to what the Lucifer would have had.

Whether the Hades had been constructed originally under orders by the GTA in order to fight the Lucifer/prepare for a second Shivan invasion, or whether it was a top-secret GTI project makes no difference.  The GTA more than likely acquired it in one way or another (through scans, investigating old GTI files, etc.), and then, with modifications to fit GTA and PVN reactor and power requirements, beam cannons were implemented.

:V: honestly could have put beam weapons on all of the Shivan warships in FS1, but they decided not to.  Whether that be for development reasons or for gameplay balance or any other reason, beam weapons simply did not make it onto every ship in the FS1 era.  To support it, I still stand by my "defunct Shivan ships" theory in my earlier post.

EDIT: Posted at the same time as Hippo.  Good thoughts in that post, too.