Speculation Saturday #2: The Fall (Destiny)

by Ragashingo , Official DBO Cryptarch, Monday, September 02, 2013, 18:45 (4099 days ago) @ Durandal

I prefer the idea of an outside power opposing the rise of humanity and the Traveler's mysterious aims in aiding us. Clearly, the galaxy is not devoid of life. If the various alien races are scavenging the ruins of humanity, for centuries if the quotes are accurate, then they cannot be sufficiently powerful in their own right. Otherwise the ability to mastermind the destruction of a solar system filled with people implies that they would have the resources to strip the conquered planets of everything of value in a relatively short time.

Right. What have these races been doing in our system for the past hundreds of years? If they just wanted our technology it seems like there'd be plenty in the ruins of our colonies. Why bother with the human city protected by the giant alien sphere at all? Either they're here specifically to wipe us out, or they want The Traveler and feel they can't get it (to protect it / destroy it / worship it / whatever) until they get rid of us. Or maybe something else is at work that we don't understand….

4. The fall took long enough that the great wall in old russia could be built, and was considered a viable defense.

The wall wasn't necessarily built after the fall started. Judging by its somewhat happy logo and the fact that its advertising says "Forward" or some such non-doom message I'd think the wall was built for other purposes. The recent Gamescon card about Old Russia, talked about how that spaceport was where man reached beyond the Earth and noting its promise (in the hopeful sense) is long gone. Perhaps it was built because of international tensions or because there were just too many wanting to colonize other planets. I don't think, however, it was built while Earth was under attack.

6. There is no debris from the force that engaged Humanity and the Traveler. Otherwise we would know more about them.

At least none that Bungie has told us about yet. I hope we do find remnants of the fall scattered about. Also, it's possible that races like The Fallen have already cleaned up most of said debris. I mean, if they can jump large warships and smaller dropships in above Old Russia why wouldn't they have scavenged the enemy's debris by now?

It would seem then that the enemy, for whatever reason liked to deploy units from orbit to the ground and did not engage in mass orbital bombardment, or maybe used WMDs sparingly (the cars outside old russia could have been hit by neutron bombs).

It's hard to say. All we've really seen of Earth beyond The City is one huge, tough looking wall, and a ton of old, possibly nuked cars. If the bulk of the enemy's forces were orbiting ships maybe they were smashed badly enough by The Traveler that the remains deorbited and largely burnt up / were lost in the oceans / scavenged by other races who apparently have at least some access to Earth's surface. The surviving enemy forces could have then retreated to where we wouldn't be able to easily find them.