- StealthSlasher2
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- Exalted Mythic Member
Brains beats brawn get used to it
Fear the Red Comet
Variety is the spice of life.
Long live games.
Death to all fanboys.
Posted by: OrderedComa
Posted by: StealthSlasher2
Posted by: Cmdr DaeFaron
Posted by: kit_103
Posted by: Cmdr DaeFaron
Actually I remember somebody here on the universe forums quoting a line. I forget the exact thing but It deals with Halsey telling somebody else about that.
Correct. In-fact, it was OP who caught the change.
Posted by: wswartzendruber
Chapter 13, paragraph 16 of First Strike (2003) has Cathrine Halsey saying:
"I know the Covenant entered the Epsilon Eridani system at approximately oh-five-hundred hours."
This passage takes place on August 30th.
Which was followed by this post...
Posted by: wswartzendruber
Heh! They're slick. Here's what the 2010 edition says:
"With regard to recent events, I likely know far more about this than you do, but let's stick with today. I know that the Covenant arrived in full force at approximately oh-five-hundred hours."
That's the specific line I was talking about, thanks Kit. I personally haven't read the re-releases yet.
Fascinating...So then under the assumption that book and game continue to co-exist it really does seem like Reach was a vulnerable little backwater planet unable to handle a relatively small Covenant fleet until the majority of the UNSC fleet rushed to her aid and formed up on the 30th of August.
Uuuh....
Why would it seem that O_o
I never saw anything in the game indicating or making it seem like Reach was a backwater planet, the very idea just seems absurd...
...A small, random, backwater colony wouldn't have even lasted a week. And it wouldn't have orbital defenses, not like what the game mentions anyway, and there wouldn't be a massive, major city with buildings the same size as Coruscant's.
I was saying 'like' in the sense that its defenses were incredibly weak all things considered. And I've already said my two cents as to how it would seem that.
There are at least a hundred ships at any given time patrolling Reach's system in addition to the SMAC and whatever miscellaneous ODPs Reach has in orbit. The Covenant manages to sneak in one Super Carrier and god knows how many Corvettes. Disregarding the sneaking aspect and fast forward to when the Carrier reveals itself and the Covenant goes guns blazing everywhere they can. In one day, Dot reports that the UNSC is recalling 60% of the UNSC ships outside of the system to defend Reach. Carter says that the ships carrying nukes are no more. On top of that, there is no plan to take out the Super Carrier until Kat's scheme comes along.
With those things said, yes, the game does make it seem like 100 ships were combat ineffective against one Super Carrier if not completely routed by it to the point they could no longer mount another attack on it themselves.
So comparatively speaking, I say 'like' a backwater planet yet again because Reach's initial defense force was brought to her knees by a single ship and its forces until reinforcements arrive to stave off the attack. It's like the initial battle of Harvest but on a far larger scale in a way. Main difference being that in 5 years the UNSC took Harvest back (for whatever a glassed planet was worth in the middle of a losing war) while in less than a month (before August 30th), 60% of the UNSC fleet + home defenses could not stave off what was not even the "main" Covenant invasion forces.
See, having Reach's local fleet plus reinforcements getting pounded into debris by the full might of a Covenant invasion force of 300+ just works because it is a massive force coming down like the hand of god all at once on everything the UNSC can muster, which is quite a lot. Having Reach's forces be put into submission by a force of one ship (Corvettes not counting as they're not a viable ship to ship attack vessel), and then subsequently unable to stave off the next wave of forces after getting a wave of reinforcements themselves, and then being completely defeated once the third final and largest wave considered to be their full force is just...sad in the sense that the first loss during the first wave should have never happened in the first place all initial defenses considered.