We suspect Vex don’t have to inhabit their distinct robot forms. The scientists rescued from the Ishtar Academy approached Vex structures like this:

Up here they have to act by biomechanical proxy. No human being in the Ishtar Academy has ever crossed the safety cordon and walked the ancient stone under the Citadel, the Vex construct that stabs up out of the world to injure space and time. It's not safe. The cellular Vex elements are infectious, hallucinogenic, entheogenic. The informational Vex elements are more dangerous yet— and there could be semiotic hazards beyond them, aggressive ideas, Vex who exist without a substrate. Even now, operating remote bodies by neural link, the team's thoughts are relayed through the warmind who saved them, sandboxed and scrubbed for hazards. Their real bodies are safe in the Academy, protected by distance and neural firewall.

Maybe there are different types of Vex worlds? Mercury was converted to be a massive simulation engine. Maybe Nessus served some different purpose? The vast quantities of “milk” which we also know as Vex “mind fluid” might suggest that Nessus was a place for Vex to... live? Reproduce? Think of Industrial Zones and Residential Zones in Sim City, just on a massive alien robot scale.

I'm on board with all of this. Though if the Vex "milk" is them reproducing... ewww.

Up here they have to act by biomechanical proxy. No human being in the Ishtar Academy has ever crossed the safety cordon and walked the ancient stone under the Citadel, the Vex construct that stabs up out of the world to injure space and time. It's not safe. The cellular Vex elements are infectious, hallucinogenic, entheogenic. The informational Vex elements are more dangerous yet— and there could be semiotic hazards beyond them, aggressive ideas, Vex who exist without a substrate. Even now, operating remote bodies by neural link, the team's thoughts are relayed through the warmind who saved them, sandboxed and scrubbed for hazards. Their real bodies are safe in the Academy, protected by distance and neural firewall.

Maybe there are different types of Vex worlds? Mercury was converted to be a massive simulation engine. Maybe Nessus served some different purpose? The vast quantities of “milk” which we also know as Vex “mind fluid” might suggest that Nessus was a place for Vex to... live? Reproduce? Think of Industrial Zones and Residential Zones in Sim City, just on a massive alien robot scale.

So from all of this, do we surmise that:

- At some point in the past there was actual life on nessus (maybe from the traveler?)
- The vex showed up and killed all life.
- The vex turned nessus into a machine world.
- Part of a functioning vex machine world is at least partially robotic plant life.

?

Quantis Rhee has almost forgotten what colors are. For months, she has prowled the deep, shadowed catacombs of Nessus—the places where the inexorable Vex burrowed into the rogue planet and replaced natural life with a cold, inhuman labyrinth.

This fits with:

Ghost: Centaurs are supposed to be just giant icy rocks. How did all this happen?
Failsafe: A robotic alien entity called the Vex have achieved 92.014 percent conversion of the Centaur Nessus.

Failsafe: Long enough to see the Vex convert this entire planetoid, kill all living organisms, reformat molecules, and digitize brain waves for further study. It's a fascinating process!

There’s also a couple of references to Nessus passing through our solar system and then disappearing for a while before reappearing 127 years ago.

FIRST 25-MATCH CRUCIBLE WINNING STREAK RECORDED. RELATED: REY, I.
CENTAUR PLANETOID "7066 NESSUS" RE-ENTERS SYSTEM AFTER UNEXPLAINED DELAY. RELAT~XXX

Ghost: This is like a… cornerstone for Nessus. Put here by the Vex to mark linear time. It's been 127 of our years since Nessus last traveled through our system. I don't know how many Vex years that is.

My best guess is that the Traveler terraformed Nessus when it was just an icy rock some time ago but later the Vex grabbed it and Vexified it, killing all the life the Travler put there replacing it with the plant and animal life we now see. Yeah, as odd as it seems, the Vex are part time gardeners:

Ghost: All the foliage around this access point is somehow augmenting its firewall. I thought the trees were mostly organic, but… just add this to the pile of things we don't understand about the Vex.

Ghost: If I'm reading this right there are… other Gardens. Like Black Garden Gardens. I couldn't tell if they were being built, or were already destroyed… what does it mean?

Does it make total sense from our perspective? No. But then... the Vex are often intentionally written to be a bit mysterious:

Ghost: This particle beam is responsible for holding this entire structure together! How do the Vex… no, don't think too hard about it. I'm still defragging from the last time I tried to figure out their physics.

So Ghost is surprised Nessus is NOT a cold dead rock, but Failsafe directly tells us there was some living organisms there.

So:

• Did she mean her crew and crew alone?
  
• Does Ghost "simply" not know the Traveler terraformed Nessus?
  
• Did the Vex terraform Nessus and THEN proceeded to kill it all in some twisted experiment?

Or was it an oversight by the writers?

So:

• Did she mean her crew and crew alone?
  
• Does Ghost "simply" not know the Traveler terraformed Nessus?
  
• Did the Vex terraform Nessus and THEN proceeded to kill it all in some twisted experiment?

Sooo... Obviously there is still what looks like life on Nessus, but maybe it's... Vex robo-plants?

Certainly a possibility, but what if we consider the following two statements:

1. The Vex killed all living organisms on Nessus at some point in the past.

2. There is currently life on Nessus, which the Vex created, transplanted, or otherwise caused to be present in some manner.

I don't think those two are mutually exclusive.

Nope. The quote is pointed in the other direction.

Ghost: Centaurs are supposed to be just giant icy rocks. How did all this happen?
Failsafe: A robotic alien entity called the Vex have achieved 92.014 percent conversion of the Centaur Nessus.

Ahh, see, later in the same quest, Failsafe says:

Ghost: How long have you been here, exactly?
Failsafe: Long enough to see the Vex convert this entire planetoid, kill all living organisms, reformat molecules, and digitize brain waves for further study. It’s a fascinating process!

Sooo... Obviously there is still what looks like life on Nessus, but maybe it's... Vex robo-plants?

...but figured any crazy over or under pressure environment would adversely affect bullet drop grenade throwing. :)

I don't know why this reminds me, but isn't it a bit weird there's no exotic that's a flamethrower? Naturally it would do Void damage.

Ghost: Centaurs are supposed to be just giant icy rocks. How did all this happen?
Failsafe: A robotic alien entity called the Vex have achieved 92.014 percent conversion of the Centaur Nessus.

Read the other stuff, and yeah. It’s mostly gameplay convenience. That said, this caught my eye:

…or cause life to flourish where it once didn't.

It is spelled out that this is exactly what the Vex did to Nessus. It used to be just a hunk of rock. Now it’s got trees and birds and so on. The Vex can certainly destroy a world like they did at Mercury, but the can also apparently create as well. Like at Nessus.. (..and The Black Garden?)

Wait, I thought I recalled a bit of dialogue where Failsafe (IIRC, it's been awhile) mentioned she predicted the vex would wipe out all life on nessus down to 99.98% extinction or something of the sort if they weren't stopped?

…or cause life to flourish where it once didn't.

It is spelled out that this is exactly what the Vex did to Nessus. It used to be just a hunk of rock. Now it’s got trees and birds and so on. The Vex can certainly destroy a world like they did at Mercury, but the can also apparently create as well. Like at Nessus.. (..and The Black Garden?)

ultimately, I think I'm with Cody on this: No efforts were made to make any of this believable or realistic outside of normal Earth norms.

You can die more than once, too!

But that's explained well by having a ghost that has the power to bring you back. The weather and gravity stuff, well, there's not anything close to an attempt being made, at least not when it comes to places that can't be explained by "the traveler did it."

Which places are those? I count one place that we visit that was not altered by the Traveler or another “sufficiently advanced” race:

• Titan

Vs

• Earth
  
• The Moon
  
• Venus
  
• The Reef
  
• Mars
  
• Phobos
  
• Oryx’s Dreadnaught
  
• Io
  
• Nessus
  
• Calus’ Leviathan

It’s funny, I almost put Titan in the second list since post-collapse Humanity has the tech to hollow out asteroids and link ships together and live in space as seen in the Reef. I don’t think we have significant gravity tech, certainly not on a planetary scale, but humanity in Destiny is still a good bit more advanced than 2018 humanity is.

Wait... Are you saying the Vex, Hive, and Cabal are on the same level as the Traveler? Okay, I had not considered them in the same league, and - as such, was definitely assuming that they couldn't do things like change gravity or cause life to flourish where it once didn't. Certainly that would change things. Also, one argument for humanity having gravity tech: The reef has normal gravity and a breathable atmosphere in D1. I'm pretty sure it's not just spinning really quickly to generate force, but maybe it is? Dunno.

Anyway, I think we're getting into some "whose capable of what" issues. Again, if you look at it (as I was/do) as only the Traveler can do full-on terraforming into a living world with normal gravity and a breathable atmosphere, then we're talking about

• Titan
  
• The Moon
  
• The Reef
  
• Phobos
  
• Oryx’s Dreadnaught
  
• Nessus
  
• Calus’ Leviathan

Vs

• Earth
  
• Venus
  
• Mars
  
• Io

Anyway, that's how I viewed it. There's no reason why the Vex, Cabal, and Hive would all decide to make their own worlds, ships, and moons all have earth-normal gravity. It just doesn't make sense. And on Titan, for example, if humans did make it earth-normal gravity, then they wouldn't have 40 foot methane waves, because the gravity would make them behave differently, right? Inconsistencies abound. I'm fine with them, but let's please not pretend that there's a perfectly reasonable and canon-supported explanation for all of this weirdness.

Of course, now that I've said that, I'm going to do my best to come up with a canon-supported argument that does explain it all.

First, we know we're NOT in a Vex simulation because they cannot simulate the Light. So that option is ruled out. BUT, it has been theorized that perhaps the Vex are the future descendants of exos via Charlemagne or another warmind gone rogue, which would explain a predilection for earth-normal gravity. Plus the certainly have the acumen to completely alter worlds (and time, and therefore spacetime, which is where gravity comes into play), so changing the gravity of places they've visited is definitely feasible and also changing it to earth specific seems to back up this theory.

For the Cabal, we know they drop planets on their enemies, so maybe they use some kind of gravitational propulsion (or pull-pulsion?) to make those things happen, though I kind of always assumed they would just use bigger and bigger bombs until the orbit shifted in the way they wanted. They don't seem to be keen on terraforming, what with most of them needing to wear masks (except Gary and his advisor... so inconsistent and frustrating to me!). I dunno, I can't think of any reason why their mars bases, phobos bases, spaceships, etc. would all have artificial gravity set to match Earth's. it doesn't make any real sense to me, even if the cabal were capable of gravity manipulation, which I doubt (because seriously why try to blow up a bomb in the dreadnaught if you could just gravity manipulate it to crash into saturn?). I can't think of any good rationale here.

The Hive, save deal. Obviously they can terraform places to become more "hive-like," but their terraforming seems quite localized, more like an infection than an organized global event, and that makes gravity manipulation on planetary or even lunar scale seem highly unlikely until, at least, the entire world is infected. And - as with the Cabal - why choose Earth standard? They've conquered thousands of worlds. There's no reason to change what they've been doing just for little ol' us.

Again, the easiest explanation is that a design decisions was made to just keep gravity consistent for the sake of gameplay, and to not explain why at all. It's a logical game design choice, though it does result in some arbitrary-ness that makes thought exercises like this one a tad disappointing. Do I wish Marathon had more outside the ship levels where you need to refill your oxygen? Yes. Do I also think it's weird that your space suit only has a few seconds of oxygen in it rather than several hours? Also yes. But the explanation of "it makes for more fun gameplay" is wholly acceptable to me. It is, after all, a game. Same applies to Destiny. It's okay to let consistency go if it makes the game more fun (see Gary just breathing whatever is around like it's no big deal while cabal grunts always wear some kind of breathing mask). Perhaps frustrating, but ultimately better for the game. Imagine if you had to figure out how to judge your jumps all over again every time you changed worlds. UGH. Much better this way.

ultimately, I think I'm with Cody on this: No efforts were made to make any of this believable or realistic outside of normal Earth norms.

You can die more than once, too!

But that's explained well by having a ghost that has the power to bring you back. The weather and gravity stuff, well, there's not anything close to an attempt being made, at least not when it comes to places that can't be explained by "the traveler did it."

Which places are those? I count one place that we visit that was not altered by the Traveler or another “sufficiently advanced” race:

• Titan

Vs

• Earth
  
• The Moon
  
• Venus
  
• The Reef
  
• Mars
  
• Phobos
  
• Oryx’s Dreadnaught
  
• Io
  
• Nessus
  
• Calus’ Leviathan

It’s funny, I almost put Titan in the second list since post-collapse Humanity has the tech to hollow out asteroids and link ships together and live in space as seen in the Reef. I don’t think we have significant gravity tech, certainly not on a planetary scale, but humanity in Destiny is still a good bit more advanced than 2018 humanity is.

ultimately, I think I'm with Cody on this: No efforts were made to make any of this believable or realistic outside of normal Earth norms.

You can die more than once, too!

But that's explained well by having a ghost that has the power to bring you back. The weather and gravity stuff, well, there's not anything close to an attempt being made, at least not when it comes to places that can't be explained by "the traveler did it."

Not sure where you stand on out-of-game info being canon, but there it is.

You are saying this to one of the guys who made a website about how Reach encroached on the book canon. Some people here have heard of it.

Lol. Fair enough.

Not sure where you stand on out-of-game info being canon, but there it is.

You are saying this to one of the guys who made a website about how Reach encroached on the book canon. Some people here have heard of it.