Question about the advisors

Extracting any information out of somebody's head is barely possible in the current state of medical/bio research. Yes yes, this is a game, but such a brutal intrusion into one's central neural system will not only cause momental death, but will certainly damage it so much that any recovery of information by 'sucking it out' will be barely possible. God, that thing virtualy made a big hole in his head! It was a brutal act of violence, panic and anger, not a surgical extraction of thoughts. They know they've been defeated, the cowards, waiting for the exact moment to strike back.
 
Maybe you'll not fight them head on but have to down traveling pods and finish them.

Low HP, easy to kill, but hard to score a hit on?
 
Just my thoughts.

OK.

Does anyone else think the advisor that peers at you through the closing silo doors doesn't really look like the two that ambush you in the finale? It actually looked to me like the one you 'wake up' in the barn. Maybe it followed you two and then alerted some bigger stronger advisors to Eli's location.

Also the one you awoke was feeding off one of those energy balls. Maybe they can actually feed off the bio-electric energy created by the human body. Perhaps they can even amp it up to get more energy out of a human body with the advantage of also burning it out and killing the person. AND maybe it can glimpse memories during this entire procedure.

Just my thoughts.

AND wouldn't it be crazy if the baby advisor you awoke was in fact Dr. Breen, recently transfered to a 'host body'.

hmmm? :)
 
GiaOmerta said:
When we encountered the advisor in the barn, he wasnt in the head of the rebel for too long... you know why? The rebel didnt know that much, the advisor quickly established this and threw him aside and was ready to move on to Gordon and Alyx.
Click to expand...

Or maybe cause the rebel was already dead. ;)
 
About the transmission, the Judith transmission does have a hunter at the end, but after one of their transmissions (just before the first real hunter attack) you see an adviser listening in at the end.

"And yes, the Combine are a race of aliens bent on the destruction of everyone on Earth, but Breen intervened and saved us from total annihilation... immediate annihilation anyhow."

I think it is (and has been all along) the Combine's goal to enslave earth, not destroy it, and Breen is just a collaborator.
 
ZachAttack said:
AND wouldn't it be crazy if the baby advisor you awoke was in fact Dr. Breen, recently transfered to a 'host body'.
Click to expand...

This would've been an interesting type of 'character development' (*Breen bug* "I will be back!" :borg:)
Although i'm pretty sure Breen certainly died in that blast long time ago at the end of HL2. A missed oportunity.
 
ZachAttack said:
OK.

Does anyone else think the advisor that peers at you through the closing silo doors doesn't really look like the two that ambush you in the finale? It actually looked to me like the one you 'wake up' in the barn. Maybe it followed you two and then alerted some bigger stronger advisors to Eli's location.

Also the one you awoke was feeding off one of those energy balls. Maybe they can actually feed off the bio-electric energy created by the human body. Perhaps they can even amp it up to get more energy out of a human body with the advantage of also burning it out and killing the person. AND maybe it can glimpse memories during this entire procedure.

Just my thoughts.

AND wouldn't it be crazy if the baby advisor you awoke was in fact Dr. Breen, recently transfered to a 'host body'.

hmmm? :)
Click to expand...

This is actually an important detail no one really considered.

They're all juvenile advisors, except the two ones at the end of the game.
 
They are all juvenile Advisors to start out with, I think. The Vort said they hatch.
 
I think they are supposed to be in some kind of lesser state when inside the Citadel (a very, very basic grub form), and enter the incubation pods in order to 'hatch; during the hatching period they develop the necessary physical stuff. Remember, their natural evolution has been completely stilted by their use of technology. They are simply grubs, and hatch with the artificial arms and so on.

I don't believe there are any 'young' Advisors at all; the Advisors are the true Combine race, all of which have technological immortality. They have been alive for a very, very long time. The two at the end acted on pure desperation.
 
Good point :thumbs:

But what about the model name being advisor_juvenile? :O
 
Juvenile as in it hasn't fully hatched probably. It lacks the arms and shizzle.
 
Maybe the arms are just an 'addon' to the biological body, like the implants in the Overwatch soldiers, maybe they are born (hatched) without them and are added later for more 'functionality' along with the electronic things that looks like two flashlights on their head
 
Advisor Cat.jpg


This is the adult form of an advisor. Only unlockable if you beat the game with only your gravity gun
 
heer0 said:
Maybe the arms are just an 'addon' to the biological body, like the implants in the Overwatch soldiers, maybe they are born (hatched) without them and are added later for more 'functionality' along with the electronic things that looks like two flashlights on their head
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's what I thought... AFAIK, biological organisms aren't capable of growing mechanical appendages, no matter how much genetic engineering you try.

EDIT: Hey, that doesn't look like a cat...
 
What cat? What cat!? :p

Couldn't resist..

BTW this thread is awsome, and so are Advisors.
 
Go an answer from Ken Birdwell!

[email protected] said:
Thanks for the email! Gabe's read all of them, but as you can see he's a little behind on answering so he asked the rest of us to help out. Okay, just kidding, Gabe was messing around with our prototype teleporter and now we have no idea where he's gotten to so it's up to us to answer these.

1) Eating implies an unordered dissolution of bio-matter. Think of it more as a destructive dissection of a neural network by both electrical, mechanical, and bio-mechanical means that results in a partial and fairly crude copy of both memories and emotional response characteristics of the unfortunate recipient of the procedure. The Advisors proboscis is specially designed for this process.

2) You people have way too much free time.
Click to expand...
 
I've only read the fist page of the thread, so sorry if it has completly changed direction, but it's time for Rim-Fire's theory:
It doesn't obtain info by sucking hte brains out, is taps in the spinal column and this physical contact, along with its powerful psychic abilities allows it to tap directly into the brain and absorb all information present.

edit:
Evidence for knowledge-sucking:
Remember the main character's conversations about the Combine getting info from Mossman? And later Kleiner mentions it about Eli too? How the hell else are they going to get it? Eli hardly seems like the kind of guy that would give in to interigation.
 
Well Ken Birdwell(Senior Software Development Engineer at Valve)confirms that the Advisors get a "fairly crude copy of both memories and emotional response characteristics of the unfortunate recipient of the procedure". Just read my last post!
 
That was almost certainly a reference to interrogation, or else the link would have been more explicit - ie. 'suck out everything she knows', rather than 'rip' or whatever he said. Everyone succumbs to the right interrogation.
Jokko88 said:
Well Ken Birdwell(Senior Software Development Engineer at Valve)confirms that the Advisors get a "fairly crude copy of both memories and emotional response characteristics of the unfortunate recipient of the procedure". Just read my last post!
Click to expand...
Wait wut.. *scrolls up* Aw sooooo lame.

Not to mention pointless. If it's 'a partial and fairly crude copy' then it's hardly 'everything he knows', nor does it seem like it has a worthwhile function in the storyline. Spastic idea.
 
The part of this that has me the most intrigued: "Emotional response characteristics".

i.e. they take on personalities, or at least characteristics, of the people they absorb.

i.e. guess who's back... back again...
 
Oh man. Maybe all the 'host body' wackos will be right as well.

Ep3 will end with a climactic battle between Advisor-Breen and Advisor-Eli.
 
Eli is so dead dude.

Breen... maybe the baby advisor.
widdle thing was so cute.
 
Eli-as-we-know-him is dead. Evil psychic spit-personality alien Eli lives on!
 
I can't say I'm impressed by that explanation either. The idea of some muscular tendril punching through a skull and absorbing memories just seems a little too far-fetched and improbable (even for Half-Life), not to mention kinda cliched.

Hopefully it's inconsequential in regards to the plot of Episode 3.
 
I'm accepting that they connect to the brain and gather information, as headcrabs controls people in the same way. If they suck out brains they probarly do it because they find it amusing.
 
Combine Elite: 'But Lord Grru'Uthalohrrg sir, we could just interrogate him and find out absolutely everything he knows...'
Advisor: 'NONSENSE! I want my partial crude copy and aint nutten gawn stop me!' *polishes proboscis*
Elite: 'It's just that it would be handy if we could get detailed schematics, comprehensive data, names, you know...'
Advisor: *PLUNGES PROBOSCIS IN* 'Mmmm...aahh...yes...this guy was a Sinatra fan! Also hated spiders SHIT GET THAT STRIDER AWAY FROM ME AIIEE'
Elite: 'sigh'
 
for the second time

the baby was feeding off that ball of energy so maybe the fact that there is no hole in the weird penis that comes out of its mouth means its actually feeding off the bio-electric energy that the human body can make, AND it also burns you out in the process.





and they get your freakin memories as an added bonus.
 
or maybe the ball of energy powers the life support system!1!!!!!1!!!eleven!!!!



and btw hi!!
 
Thanks Zach, I guess I'm just too slow to be able to comprehend such a complex idea.
 
I actually like that explanation somewhat...the Combine now have an idea of what's going on without making them all-powerful by having them know everything. That was my main gripe with the original "Advisors suck out your thoughts" theory.

Although if we get anything as lame as "Eli-in-Advisor-body", there will be killing.
 
Advisor + Mans Brain = Man's Knowledge?

So therefore if I ate a sheeps brain would I learn that grass is a tasty and nutritious snack?
 
Fuzileer said:
Advisor + Mans Brain = Man's Knowledge?

So therefore if I ate a sheeps brain would I learn that grass is a tasty and nutritious snack?
Click to expand...

No. You don't have the ability to absorb the brain. Think of it like cows and grass. They are able to properly digest grass due to the fact that their bodies are specially 'designed' to do that. In the same way, the Advisors are designed to learn from the people whose brains they suck out (or whatever), and learn vague things about what they did, etc.
 
Nitre said:
No. You don't have the ability to absorb the brain. Think of it like cows and grass. They are able to properly digest grass due to the fact that their bodies are specially 'designed' to do that. In the same way, the Advisors are designed to learn from the people whose brains they suck out (or whatever), and learn vague things about what they did, etc.
Click to expand...

There is no sucking involved...
Take a close look at the tongue of the advisor that nearly eats you.

Theres no hole in the end of the appendage.

See my above post.
 
ZachAttack said:
There is no sucking involved...
Take a close look at the tongue of the advisor that nearly eats you.

Theres no hole in the end of the appendage.

See my above post.
Click to expand...

That's why i said 'Or whatever'
 
Well the vortigaunt says that the advisors are in their larval stage. Maybe the brain has certain proteins(or whatever) that helps them to metamorphosize. If that is the case I wonder what a mature advisor looks like.
 
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