Combine Vs. Xen - the final solution

Which means that even if Valve didn't plan for the Combine when making HL1, they would have at least implemented healing pools and teleportation technology in HL2 to make you think 'gawd, ain't this familiar'.
 
Icant see why these people are in denial. The Combine have not entered Xen. It is so fricking obvious.
IF THEY WERE IN CONTROL OF XEN, WHY HAD NONE KNOWN OF THERE EXISTANCE WHILE THE BMRF WERE CONDUCTING RESEARCH IN XEN?
Simple: The Combine have never stepped foot in Xen, because they cant. That is why the Xenians fled to Xen. Because they knew it was safe
 
Safe, for the time being, at least. Which is why they were pouring so many resources into producing a standing army. Preparing for the inevitable return of the Combine.

-Angry Lawyer
 
IF THEY WERE IN CONTROL OF XEN, WHY HAD NONE KNOWN OF THERE EXISTANCE WHILE THE BMRF WERE CONDUCTING RESEARCH IN XEN?
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How did you determine this? To me it's pretty obvious the cascade accident caused by gordon in hl1 was arranged by someone in its administration. Hence this person had a deal with someone, and I don't think it were the xenians. If I had to put my money on it I'd say the arrangement was between dr.Breen and the Combine (eg. the other professors hate Breen because he sold them out before the cascade even happened).

Also, about the teleports, it was nihilanth who caused them to appear, not some unorganic technology. Maybe that's why they weren't able to reproduce it. You could also argue that his teleporting abilities only worked in the xen environment.

But the main quality that seems to be part of the combine mentality is: "let's turn their own kind against themselves with as little resources as possible." They didn't need xenian healingpools on earth because the healingposts on the walls were enough, they could be created locally and didn't require any interdimensional transportation.

So the big picture I've got is:
-earth scientists discover teleporting & Xen, send reckon teams
-contact is made with xenians, combines find out, contact the teamleader (Breen) and convince him to arrange a cascade accident for the good of mankind.
-Combine really want to invade earth, order nihilanth to attack as soon as he can. Combine think the xenians are enough to weaken earth forces until they get there themselves.
-Gordon, being in the middle of it, goes to xen and destroys nihilanth, freeing the vortigaunts. Unexpected move for the combines. Now the vortigaunts join in the battle against their opressor, the combine. This is why the gman helps gordon. He's (or his contractors are) against the combine and put the vortigaunts and the humans together to fight them, so they'd do more dammage and stand a better chance.

So I think the army was ment to attack earth, not to protect from the combine.
I also think the vortigaunts did flee to xen, but where caught and enslaved by the combine, with nihilanth there for control. Otherwise the vortigaunts actions wouldn't make any sense.

My 0.02€
 
That makes no difference. Infact, you've proved my point. The deal was made between Dr.Breen and the Combine so that a portal would be opened. Why? So Freeman or the science team would close it, and in doing so open a portal storm so that the Combine could enter Earth. The Combine are NOT allied with Xen, and could not enter Xen. Its pretty much spelt out on the first ****ing page
 
Im not hostile, im cool by usual standards :p
If the Combine could control Xen, why didnt they use their Teleportation? Why hadnt they developed Local Teleportation? Because they didnt need to try and develop it, because they didnt know where the Xenians were
 
Llama said:
Im not hostile, im cool by usual standards :p
If the Combine could control Xen, why didnt they use their Teleportation? Why hadnt they developed Local Teleportation? Because they didnt need to try and develop it, because they didnt know where the Xenians were
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Have you even read this thread?
 
Yes i have, smartarse. I was one of the first to reply. I have far more of an idea about these games than you think, dont ever DARE try and call me an idiot. If you beleive the Combine were on Xen, face the facts. YOU. WERE. WRONG.
If you dont, then dont cheek me anyway. You could at least show me why my points are useless, and how i've grasped the story wrong.
 
This is just my 2 cents worth, but I believe the Combine are trying to take over Xen and the Xenians, like they are taking over City 17 and the Rebellion, and maybe the Combine are an alternate race or clan of Xenians... think of it like the Nazis they were germans yet they take over germany and surrounding countries, just like the combine.
 
I'm not sure what they're up to, but the key word I agree with in the above post is "Trying". As in, they haven't quite done it yet.

-Angry Lawyer
 
One argument for 'the combine were on Xen' is that if the teleportation was controlled by Nihilanth, and the Combine controlled Nihilanth, then as soon as Nihilanth was taken down they'd no longer be able to teleport easily and directly to Earth in HL2.

-Sulkdodds

edit: :p
 
How is that an argument for? If anything, against. Freeman killed the Nihilanth, so if that is true there would be no HL2
 
Nope. Because with Nihilanth dead, they'd have to find alternate methods of teleportation - which they do have in HL2 - but the result of Freeman killing Nihilanth is that it would mark out Earth as a world to be arse-raped. Without Nihilanth the only drawback for them (in terms of interdimensional travel) would be that they wouldn't be able to teleport easily as the Xen aliens did. And in HL2, they can't. Instead they'd have to teleport, um, like they do in HL2.

However it could be argued that if the Combine had the technology to create a creature such as Nihilanth with the power to do such teleportation, why wouldn't they create another one or use the same technology to the same effect for HL2?

And seriously, you can't argue that if they had that tech they wouldn't use it. Think of how useful it would be to teleport troops to anywhere any time. If the Combine could do that, they certainly would.
 
Good points. But yeah, if you have a tank, your opponent has twigs are you doing to just make one tank? I think not
 
Llama said:
Yes i have, smartarse. I was one of the first to reply. I have far more of an idea about these games than you think, dont ever DARE try and call me an idiot. If you beleive the Combine were on Xen, face the facts. YOU. WERE. WRONG.
If you dont, then dont cheek me anyway. You could at least show me why my points are useless, and how i've grasped the story wrong.
Click to expand...
If you had actually read the thread, you might have noticed that we have been discussing the VERY POINTS YOU BROUGHT UP for the past few days.. So I reiterate, did you actually read this thread? The entire thread?
 
one thing I wondered

The Combine-on-Xen debate seems to revolve around a couple unsolved issues here, and the one that gets me the most is that of the bee shooters from HL1 (I don't know too many official enemy names, sorry). Now, it's pretty obvious that the Xen factory was mass-producing them, but their origin is hazy. The prevailing theories seem to be that either they're being made by the Combine or by the Xenians as an army. I don't think they're like the Overwatch guys, because they don't have anything in common with the Vortigaunts. However, if the Xenians were making them, what were they making them FROM? Again, they're probably not Vortigaunts, and I didn't see any other Xenian life form that might have served as a starting block for them. Plus, they really don't seem to fit into the Xenian food chain (nor do the fish, seeing as how there's nothing for them to eat besides the little maggot things).

So. Seeing as the Vortigaunts, Nihilanth, and the Alien Controllers all originally came from somewhere else, they would have had to bring the bee shooters and fish with them as well. Which doesn't seem to make much sense.

Now, if the Combine were to have controlled Xen, then that would be a much more logical origin for the bee shooters and fish. The bee shooters might be one of their standard unit models, much like the synths.
 
The bee-shooters are called hive-hands as far as I know.

But to address the point about Grunts and Vortigaunts - they do have things in common. They have the same basic structure - bipedal with those backward-pointing ankles and vestigal third limbs - and they have similar eye arrangements. It seems to me that Grunts are genetically modified from Vortigaunt material to be bigger, badder and stronger.

On the one hand, these could be bred specifically to form a massive army, because the Xenians knew the time would come when they'd have to face the music and fight the Combine.

On the other hand, they could be modified from Vorts in the same way that Combine Soldiers are modified from humans.

The thing about synths is that they all share a very similar design ethos - and that ethos is to be found nowhere on Xen. This was Angry Lawyer's main point all along as far as I know, and it holds true - Xen conspicuously lacks design elements apparently common to all Combine stuff. Xen is, in fact, the antithesis of the Combine - it's all icky and organic whereas the Combine favour very clean, austere futurism.



What I'd like to know is how many of you reckon the Combine controlled Xen after HL1? Because if they didn't I don't know how they would have enslaved the Vortigaunts...
 
I still don't think the bee shooters are evolved forms of the Vortigaunts. They don't share enough similarities at all. For instance, why evolve them away from the lightning blasts? The lightning blasts do more damage, and make it impossible to disarm them. It just seems entirely too inefficient for them to be evolved forms. I looked again, and you're right about the legs, but I don't see much similarity in the eyes or anything else. And where'd they get the stomach pincers from?

Then I guess it all comes back to Nihilanth. If the Combine used him to enslave the Vortigaunts, then there would have been no need for them to import a lot of offworld technology to Xen. The Vortigaunts were more than capable of harvesting the resources, building the bee shooters (I guess they're called Grunts then?), and teleporting them out to other Combine worlds. But, if Nihilanth wasn't under combine control while on Xen, then the Combine hadn't been there yet when Gordon killed Nihilanth.

Of course, there's nothing saying that the Combine couldn't have gone to Xen after Freeman had been put into stasis. But perhaps that's a debate for another time.

And I'm STILL curious about those damn fish.
 
UndeadScottsman said:
If you had actually read the thread, you might have noticed that we have been discussing the VERY POINTS YOU BROUGHT UP for the past few days.. So I reiterate, did you actually read this thread? The entire thread?
Click to expand...

Perhpas, if you took the time to read the 10 or so pages of size 10 size ive typed about things like this, you'de know I know what im talking about. Do you think that i might BE REPEATING WHAT HAS BEEN SAID because some people still refuse to accept the truth?
No, of course you didn't think of that. :dozey:

safetyswami said:
I still don't think the bee shooters are evolved forms of the Vortigaunts. They don't share enough similarities at all. For instance, why evolve them away from the lightning blasts? The lightning blasts do more damage, and make it impossible to disarm them. It just seems entirely too inefficient for them to be evolved forms. I looked again, and you're right about the legs, but I don't see much similarity in the eyes or anything else. And where'd they get the stomach pincers from?

Then I guess it all comes back to Nihilanth. If the Combine used him to enslave the Vortigaunts, then there would have been no need for them to import a lot of offworld technology to Xen. The Vortigaunts were more than capable of harvesting the resources, building the bee shooters (I guess they're called Grunts then?), and teleporting them out to other Combine worlds. But, if Nihilanth wasn't under combine control while on Xen, then the Combine hadn't been there yet when Gordon killed Nihilanth.

Of course, there's nothing saying that the Combine couldn't have gone to Xen after Freeman had been put into stasis. But perhaps that's a debate for another time.

And I'm STILL curious about those damn fish.
Click to expand...

No Combine Control. The grunts arn't really 'Evolved' they are grown and altered using the containers. Who knows what they might look like unaltered
 
Firstly, Llama, cool the hell down. This isn't politics.

I don't know about the fish and guns, but they could have been modified from barnacles, snarks or something we've enver seen - don't make the mistake of thinking that what we saw on Xen was all there was on Xen. I really don't think it's relevant where they got those from, simply because there's the possibility of so much we never saw there.

If the Combine were on Xen, wouldn't they have used at least one synth?
 
Sulkdodds said:
If the Combine were on Xen, wouldn't they have used at least one synth?
Click to expand...
Why they dont use them in City 17??

btw Only Element Alpha is right...
 
Polaris said:
Sorry - Why they dont use them in City 17? They only manifactured them in Citadel...
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Ummm they do, Gunships, dropships, Striders - all Synth.
 
Samon said:
Ummm they do, Gunships, dropships, Striders - all Synth.
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true...but mayby Gargantua, Manta... are Synth too. Just idea.
 
Doubtful, they look far too organic to be Synth. Well, at least the Manta is.
 
Look at Gargantua, its big, it have very weird skin and it have flamethrowers - its not typical Xen animal...
 
Um, yes it is. It's got a similar carapace structure to both the Panthereye and the Chumtoad, and to an extent, the HL1 Vortigaunt concept arts.

-Angry Lawyer
 
Polaris said:
Look at Gargantua, its big, it have very weird skin and it have flamethrowers - its not typical Xen animal...
Click to expand...

Xen doesn't have any particular wildlife, it's a border world - all sorts of aliens come through and get stuck their.
 
Besides, the Xenians - if you don't believe the Combine were on Xen - had already shown themselves to be able to genetically modify Grunts and cover them in armour, grafting hive-hands onto their arm stumps. They had already 'created' Nihilanth. The garg, in fact, has the same visual style as the grunts - it's a big animal with armour and weapons grafted onto it. Hell, the flamer hands even look quite like the bee-shooters.

The Xenians share their own coherent design ethos, visual style and 'look'. The Combine have their own seperate shared design. And both of them look completely different.

Why they dont use them in City 17??
Click to expand...

They do. :p
 
Here's a few valid questions for those who say xen wasn't in the combines' control during HL1:

If they couldn't get to Xen because they couldn't teleport there, how did they get in touch with earth?
How did one find out about the existence of the other (humans & combine I mean)?
What does destroying nihilanth in HL1 change (in the perspective of combine, earth, or even gman) if this is true?
What do the combines have to do with the HL story in the first place?

I'm just trying to expose that the story would be far to thin if xen wasn't under combine control during HL1.
 
Element Alpha said:
If they couldn't get to Xen because they couldn't teleport there, how did they get in touch with earth?
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The same way as we found Xen. Coincidence.
Or, an event in the magnitude of a Resonance Cascade has to show up on some sort of big scientific equipment. Perhaps that notified them.
If they're attacking lots of worlds with tunneling tech, they must have a way of detecting worlds in the first place. And I'm sure Samon has a sound byte from an extended (and cut) ending sequence, where Eli yells something about, if Breen gives them the tech, they'll be free to "Pop between Universes at will, and enslave everyone" or something.
Or, again, maybe they've always known about us, and have only just gotten around to attacking?

Element Alpha said:
How did one find out about the existence of the other (humans & combine I mean)?
Click to expand...
See above.

Element Alpha said:
What does destroying nihilanth in HL1 change (in the perspective of combine, earth, or even gman) if this is true?
Click to expand...
The Xenians no longer represent an organised threat to Earth, and, when the Combine eventually reach them through Mossman's tech, they have no real method of defending themselves. And the G-Man probably doesn't give a damn.

Element Alpha said:
What do the combines have to do with the HL story in the first place?
Click to expand...
The entity that assaulted the Xenians, and forced them to migrate over to Xen?

-Angry Lawyer
 
Element Alpha said:
What do the combines have to do with the HL story in the first place?
Click to expand...

Why do they even need to be associated with HL1's story? Fair enough, we now know that they are connected, due to that Lombardi quote, but why do have to have played a large part in the story of HL1? There's already plenty of continuity with HL1 in the form of dimensional disturbances, Xen aliens left on earth, vorts, characters carried over from the first one - why do people want the bad guys to be the same, too?

How does a lack of association make the story "far to thin" (sic)?? Surely different bad guys being responsible for the events in each game makes the story deeper?

AFAI'm concerned, you don't need the bad guys to be the same because the dimensional meddling and portal disturbances provide enough continuity in themselves - mankind meddled in stuff they shouldn't have in the first game and got screwed, they thought they had wrapped it up but they hadn't, and so a larger and darker threat than the Xenians is alerted to Earth's existence. The difference in scale and lethality of the bad guys ups the stakes and gives you more to play for.
 
While I'll never make a flat statement regarding the Combine's nature or their purported occupation of Xen, Laivasse long ago persuaded me that, bluntly, the idea of defeating (and effectively allying) with the first hostiles you encounter in the face of a collosal, unstoppable foe is one hell of a development.
 
Okay, I'll admit that Gordon Freeman's (and by extension ours) exposure to Xen was quite limited, which precludes us from knowing whether Gargantuans or the fish are viable members of Xen's ecosystem or not. But couldn't it also be possible that there was evidence of a Combine presence on Xen that Gordon didn't see? I mean, most of Earth in HL2 was pretty much free of any Combine technology. Couple that with the fact that Gordon teleported a bunch instead of walking everywhere, and there could have been countless synths and even citadels that he just never saw.

Hell, maybe Nihilanth's chamber was inside a citadel. You just teleport into his room; who knows where it was or whether it was part of a much larger structure or not? Look at Breen's office, it was tailored to human needs and comfort. If Nihilanth was controlling Xen for the Combine, maybe that's like his office.

I guess all I'm trying to say is that the argument that Gordon didn't see much of Xen is a two-way street.
 
Aha, but:

- Freeman must have been going to rather central or at least important locations while in Xen - a factory, Nihilanth's chamber, eccetera.

- Elusive wildlife would be unlikely to be found in such central/industrialised locations - for example, it's unlikely you'd find a panda wandering around Washington DC.

- Combine tech meanwhile, is more likely to be found in such central/industrialised locations - for example, it's likely that you'd find one of those distinctive human government buildings while in Washington DC. Like the White House.

Considering that Gordon journeyed into the heart of the Xenian machine, he have seen Combine tech if there was any anywhere. But he might not necessarily have seen elusive wildlife.
 
Breen is evidently responsible for Resonance cascade - invasion Xenians, and he is leader of Combine on Earth. This connection is evident...
 
Polaris said:
Breen is evidently responsible for Resonance cascade - invasion Xenians, and he is leader of Combine on Earth. This connection is evident...
Click to expand...

All Breen did was give the order for the experiment, there's no evidence that he had any connection with the Xen aliens beforehand. In fact, I very much doubt it. Breen is as responsible as Gordon is for the RC.
 
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