- last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT
Posted by: Halo3plzzz xP
I have to disagree with that. The MAC guns at Reach, though highly outnumbered, withstood for atleast 8 hours. The aformentioned was stated in FoR when Dr. Halsey was talking to Fred about how long she had been bunkered down inside the 'King Under the Mountain', or whatever it was called.
Also, you are correct, much of the UNSC fleet was destroyed at Reach. Think about it though, do you really think they would have risked more ships than they could spare in order to protect Earth? I don't think so.
Furthermore, MAC guns fire faster than Covenant ship weapons. Like Cortana said, the Covenant renovate, they don't innovate, and for that reason they have a horrible method of preparing their plasma, which slows down their rate of fire. Why do you suppose they needed to board the Athens and the Malta in order to destroy them? Because they were just incapable of shooting them out of the sky.
Finally, we have to be realists. This is fictional after all, and I doubt Jason Jones would destroy the Earth. I know most storytellers try to be unpredictable and sometimes bring in drastic plot-twists and even kill of the main characters, but destroying Earth is just too far out there. Earth will live, one way or another; I'm certain of it.
Those are good points. But remember that the MACs would have been slagged early on had those huge refitting ships not sacrificed themsleves by covering them. I don't know, without hard data on range, rate of fire, etc, it's impossible to know. But I thought about what I said about most of the fleet being destroyed at Reach. In the First Strike chapter that takes place at HighCom in Sydney, they talk about how much of the fleet had been lost, and I can't remember exactly what was said, only that it was disastrous. Basically like Pearl Harbor, except more crippling. How many ships are available for Earth defense depends on how many ships were posted at other stations around Earth. Sgt Johnson says at the beginning of H2, "Ships have been coming in all day," meaning they probably recalled all that was left of the fleet. Whether this is more or less than what was at Reach, we won't know until the book comes out.
Speaking of the book, any updates? Has Nylund agreed to write it? I need my Halo fix!