Blow up the ship, which is not a threat at all at this point in time.
Assault to take back the city.
Gault takes the light.
Final Showdown.

This bugged me too, but I assumed I was missing something.

The mission to destroy The Almighty tried to make it seem like the Sun was going supernova at any moment and we had to stop it. But with Gaul still on Earth and his entire army still in the solar system, surely the danger could not have been imminent.

But you destroy The Almighty and... it doesn't seem to matter much, least of all to Gaul. It's not like he was using it as leverage. The Almighty gets blown up and all that happens is Gaul's adviser mentions it in passing and the game continues as normal. The final showdown continues exactly as it would have if the Almighty had still been there, or if it never even existed.

It makes sense to me. In the Cabal society, you come home victorious or not at all. Remember, they crashed their ship into the dreadnaught b/c that was preferable to going home in shame. If we had taken out Ghaul first, the remaining Cabal would have pressed on with the destruction of the sun in order to claim victory.

We took out their plan B before stopping plan A

(I balk at the "therefore/but" rule, but I balk at storytelling 'rules' in general, because blah blah subjectivity. I felt like mentioning this for completeness' sake but don't actually want to talk about it, because my argument is mainly esoteric and irrelevant to the spirit of storytelling guidelines.)

Blindly following the 'rules' without a sense of the underlying dramatic principles they reinforce is a pretty good way to make your story rigid and soulless. However, I really think the 'therefore / but' rule is beyond a mere guideline, and gets to the heart of what good storytelling and good drama is.

How would my guardian, or anyone for that matter know that’s where Cayde went? How did they find out this information?

Failsafe boasted his distress calls into space. She tells you so during the first mission on Nessus.

But we don't see that until we get there. Where is the scene where we receive that transmission? You need to know why you are going to Nessus before you go there!

How would my guardian, or anyone for that matter know that’s where Cayde went? How did they find out this information?

Failsafe boasted his distress calls into space. She tells you so during the first mission on Nessus.

Cayde is on Nessus to get a Vex teleporter. Why did he want that?

To teleport right next to Gaul and shoot him. He tells you this directly.

On Io, we do something with a Warmind… which has no connection to anything. Maybe I just don’t remember, but how did anything we did on Io lead to Ikora coming back? Again, we lack the narrative / logical / emotional connections here.

We used the Warmind and it sensors throughout the system to find the Almighty which in turn convinced Ikora that dying was worth saving the solar system. It also gets us scans of the Almighty so we know how to kill it.

(Sorry for the delayed response. I’ve only now started my 2nd play through and am coming across the answers to your questions.)

I think there's more to this that we don't yet know.

When I was playing, my understanding was that the protagonists were assuming that Zavala's assault was doomed to fail because the Cabal would just retreat as quickly as they came and blow up the Sun, which would be pretty consistent with their previous behavior (Shield Brothers strike). None of the protagonists were aware of Ghaul's actual plans involving the Traveler beyond cutting off the Light, although we as the players are due to the Ghaul cutscenes.

But the player knows his actual plans. I am actually not sure about how I feel when a player knows something the character they play would not. In film it's pretty common for the main character to not know some aspect of the villain's plan, but this is almost always done to create dramatic irony for the audience.

Yeah, even though it makes sense that the characters would act the way they are in this scenario, the effect as a player is that they appear to be directing their energies in the wrong place. I think there are ways this could have been pulled this off, but it felt disjointed because the draw (for me) was to the tension between Gaul and the Speaker that my character couldn't have possibly known about.

Notice that Naughty Dog, who are universally praised for their game narratives, basically never show the player anything that the main character doesn't either see or know.

Way back with Crash 2, the opening cutscene has Cortex hatching a plan which Crash doesn't see. We know he's using Crash for evil, but Crash doesn't know. I remember that bothering me. Why would I get the crystals for him, when I know Cortex isn't on my side?

When I was playing, my understanding was that the protagonists were assuming that Zavala's assault was doomed to fail because the Cabal would just retreat as quickly as they came and blow up the Sun, which would be pretty consistent with their previous behavior (Shield Brothers strike). None of the protagonists were aware of Ghaul's actual plans involving the Traveler beyond cutting off the Light, although we as the players are due to the Ghaul cutscenes.

But the player knows his actual plans. I am actually not sure about how I feel when a player knows something the character they play would not. In film it's pretty common for the main character to not know some aspect of the villain's plan, but this is almost always done to create dramatic irony for the audience.

Yeah, even though it makes sense that the characters would act the way they are in this scenario, the effect as a player is that they appear to be directing their energies in the wrong place. I think there are ways this could have been pulled this off, but it felt disjointed because the draw (for me) was to the tension between Gaul and the Speaker that my character couldn't have possibly known about.

Blow up the ship, which is not a threat at all at this point in time.
Assault to take back the city.
Gault takes the light.
Final Showdown.

The mission to destroy The Almighty tried to make it seem like the Sun was going supernova at any moment and we had to stop it. But with Gaul still on Earth and his entire army still in the solar system, surely the danger could not have been imminent.

When I was playing, my understanding was that the protagonists were assuming that Zavala's assault was doomed to fail because the Cabal would just retreat as quickly as they came and blow up the Sun, which would be pretty consistent with their previous behavior (Shield Brothers strike). None of the protagonists were aware of Ghaul's actual plans involving the Traveler beyond cutting off the Light, although we as the players are due to the Ghaul cutscenes.

But the player knows his actual plans. I am actually not sure about how I feel when a player knows something the character they play would not. In film it's pretty common for the main character to not know some aspect of the villain's plan, but this is almost always done to create dramatic irony for the audience. We know who Buffalo Bill is and what he's doing, but Clarice is trying to find out.

But if you are controlling the character, and if the character knowing what you know would cause them to act differently, then I generally think this is a bad idea. Like, if you knew Liquid's plan in Metal Gear Solid, you would not insert that PAL card would you?

I don't think that works, and is another reason why storytelling in video games is hard / problematic on an intrinsic level.

Second: Can the light be taken or not? The speaker tells Gaul that the light can’t be taken; it can only be given. Then, in a mission on Io we check out an experiment which was trying to extract light and give it to other lifeforms. At the end of the mission we are told the experiment failed and that won’t work. Okay, so the game is telling us Gaul can’t take the light. But does this not completely nullify Gaul’s storyline? The traveler sure as shit isn’t going to give Gaul its light… so he’s failed before he’s even begun. But oops, I guess he can take it after all, as that’s what he does for the finale. So why on Earth would Bungie be setting up the rules of light such that they completely remove any drama or worry with regards to Gaul, and then go and just break that rule? Worse, it just makes all the scenes with the speaker pure wheel spinning where no plot propulsion is happening. We learn about him and his past, which is good, but no actions actually materialize from this that matter within the overall narrative.

All the talk of taking and giving light does seem like a lot of mumbo-jumbo, but are we sure what happens with Ghaul at the end of the game? He "takes" Light in that he is able to wield supers (which was spectacularly terrifying, btw), but he has definitely not become a Guardian, as his resurrection is not Ghost-driven and uh, short lived. Some Grimoire cards would be nice.

Blow up the ship, which is not a threat at all at this point in time.
Assault to take back the city.
Gault takes the light.
Final Showdown.

This bugged me too, but I assumed I was missing something.

The mission to destroy The Almighty tried to make it seem like the Sun was going supernova at any moment and we had to stop it. But with Gaul still on Earth and his entire army still in the solar system, surely the danger could not have been imminent.

But you destroy The Almighty and... it doesn't seem to matter much, least of all to Gaul. It's not like he was using it as leverage. The Almighty gets blown up and all that happens is Gaul's adviser mentions it in passing and the game continues as normal. The final showdown continues exactly as it would have if the Almighty had still been there, or if it never even existed.

The Almighty was sort of a contingency. "Test me and risk annihilation." The gang didn't know about Gaul's issues and how he was desperate to be chosen, they just knew they had to stop Gaul before he forcibly took the light. To make a move on the City they wanted to ensure Gaul couldn't just leave and pull the trigger on the sun.

Blow up the ship, which is not a threat at all at this point in time.
Assault to take back the city.
Gault takes the light.
Final Showdown.

The mission to destroy The Almighty tried to make it seem like the Sun was going supernova at any moment and we had to stop it. But with Gaul still on Earth and his entire army still in the solar system, surely the danger could not have been imminent.

When I was playing, my understanding was that the protagonists were assuming that Zavala's assault was doomed to fail because the Cabal would just retreat as quickly as they came and blow up the Sun, which would be pretty consistent with their previous behavior (Shield Brothers strike). None of the protagonists were aware of Ghaul's actual plans involving the Traveler beyond cutting off the Light, although we as the players are due to the Ghaul cutscenes.

Blow up the ship, which is not a threat at all at this point in time.
Assault to take back the city.
Gault takes the light.
Final Showdown.

This bugged me too, but I assumed I was missing something.

The mission to destroy The Almighty tried to make it seem like the Sun was going supernova at any moment and we had to stop it. But with Gaul still on Earth and his entire army still in the solar system, surely the danger could not have been imminent.

But you destroy The Almighty and... it doesn't seem to matter much, least of all to Gaul. It's not like he was using it as leverage. The Almighty gets blown up and all that happens is Gaul's adviser mentions it in passing and the game continues as normal. The final showdown continues exactly as it would have if the Almighty had still been there, or if it never even existed.

Of course it would have been better if Ikora made a real sacrifice. But, Bungie would never kill her off, so I posited a realistic option.

I doubted it would happen, but I was desperately hoping that Bungie would do something really bold like kill off Zavala, Cayde, and Ikora. Have them go out in a meaningful way while also clearing space for better characters to replace them in the future.

Earth and the Almighty. That's really all the locations you need for the story to work.

I just beat the campaign with my 2nd character last night. Unlike my first playthrough, where I spent a lot of time doing adventures and quests in between story missions, this time I mainlined the campaign missions with as few detours as possible. In terms of the raw plot of the game, Nessus, Titan, and Io feel almost throwaway. You land, do 1 or 2 missions, then off to the next planet. Nothing of consequential substance happens on any of them, short of stealing the vex teleporter (plot device) and Ikora discerning Gaul's plan (which didn't really need to happen... the guardian's could easily have been motivated to retake the city without knowing what Gaul's ultimate goal was).

Not that I'm complaining really. I like that each planet's patrol/adventure/quest missions tell their own side stories. But it does make the whole "trip around the galaxy" feel somewhat contrived.

Of course it would have been better if Ikora made a real sacrifice. But, Bungie would never kill her off, so I posited a realistic option.

They have such an easy out, though. Kill off as many of the guardians as you want during the main story. Kill all of them so the player is the only one left, it's FINE. Because when you free the traveler, the ghosts will just come back to life (or the Traveler can release new ghosts) and all of your dead buddies will come back, too. I'm similarly disappointed in this story for not having any teeth. It's worlds better than D1, and yet still a middling tale full of rehashed tropes, tired arcs, and uninspired action. There are a few funny jokes, especially the ones that make fun of D1 (read the lore on MIDA.. oh man), but for the most part this is just boring, nonsensical schlock with no real stakes.