Posted by:ScubaToaster
Posted by: HipiO7
This man, this man right here put it so eloquently that I actually cancelled my own 2000+ word long post.
/slow clap for respect
:)
The person who said participating is important, not winning, obviously never won anything.
Posted by: anton1792
Posted by: HipiO7
I would love to see the kill/death ratio of the Elite's on marines during the war. I can assure you in direct combat, the Elite's come out winning. The Elite's only seem so inefficient because that's what we see. Yes, I agree there are times where they act dumb and deserve to loose the battles, but who knows how many battles throughout the war the Elite's came clearly out in victory. We just dont know of them.
That is pretty asinine. Basically, you just said to me: "Just because we don't see it doesn't mean that it is not there, therefore it is there".
We do not see it, so there is no evidence for it (In the case of reading) therefore we do not act under the assumption that it is, because there is scant evidence for it. All we see are Elites getting hammered by a numerically and technologically inferior foe groundside. We don't see contrary evidence, so why act like it is there?
We don't see a pink unicorn in any Halo media. Does that mean that it is there too, or that it should even be treated as a sensible possibility?
Posted by: HipiO7
But then again, with the Spartans, not all Elite's are natural killing machines, even if trained all their lifes. Just like not anyone could become Spartans. The Elite's that werent focused and what not died. End of story. The Elite's that were cunning, resourceful, adaptive, and intelligent survived throughout the war and rose through the ranks. Elite's that are higher in the ranks is because they have proven, again and again, how combat effective they are individually or in squads, on the field of battle.
What makes this Elite's tactical experience any more than the commander of the Marine/ODSTs groups? That is basically what was being asked. The answer is nothing necessarily.
*Should say how scalp count is not as reliable as promotion based primarily on tactical and strategic ability*
Posted by: HipiO7
The best example of an Elite that perfectly fits my ideal is the one aboard Acendant Justice in First Strike. The ONLY REASON the Chief managed to beat him, which he did not even manage to kill the Elite, was because Johnson and Locklear were there to lay fire on him. Had it not been for them, I have no doubt John would have lost.
Had John a fully functioning suit of armour, bullets in his AR and a few days of rest I have no doubt that the Elite would be dead just like all the others.
And the Elite is an idiot. Want to know why? He threw away his gun (And the chance to nail John right then and there) and took off his helmet. This would later come back to bite him in the ass when John nearly gets the plasma pistol and when the Elite trips on his own helmet and falls on his ass.
And this is your best example?
Posted by: HipiO7
From what I remember, ODST's and Marines were always present aboard naval ships. Yet again, look at Dirt in Evolutions. Gage and his ODST's were flash unfreezed just in case their ship was boarded when their battle group was ambushed. Look at the Pillar of Autumn when it was boarded, there were marines all over the place fighting, trying to contain the breaches.
There were only slightly more than 20 men on the vessel when Thel got there (That includes the ones who tried to repel Thel's boarders). If that is not the naval crew then who was controlling the ship and making sure that its information systems were properly irretrievable?
Posted by: HipiO7
And I only remember Thel using one grenade in the whole fight when they were ambushed at the Bridge. And you saw how easily Thel managed to take out all those Marines, with or without his teammates help, he still managed to kill the majority of them by himself.
It is plural. Page 140 of Cole Protocol for anyone interested in confirming that.
As for your example from Dirt saying how it was an Ultra specifically that killed those ODSTs. You are lying. I checked it and no indication is given as to the Elite's rank. Page 130 is where that line is at.
Oh wow. I could have sworn that it said something about an Ultra taking out the ODST's. But I currently dont have any of the books at hand.
But then look at it that way. It wasent even an Ultra that took out all those ODST's, which leaves space for it to have been a lower rank, which means in straightforward combat, using a melee weapon, it was still able to kill almost of them. That says something about the Elites cunning and intelligence.
About not seeing them. The Spartan's are the same, most in the rank and file of the UNSC have never seen a Spartan, they have only heard of them and elevated them to near God status and taken them for given. Same would go for Ultras. We barly know they exist because there are very few testimony's to account for them, which means they normally left no survivors. Look at it in Reach, when Halsey describe's the Zealot teams in Sword Base after the secound mission. We are almost 80% of the time seeing everything from the UNSC's point of view, we only normally get informed on the battles that the UNSC wins or were winning before having to pull back. If the Covenant win a battle, we will never see what forces partook in the fight, unless from what survivors say. And from what it looks like, the Ultras were not easily killed or even killed at all.
True and true. I wont deny that had John been as well rested as the Elite, the fight would have been more equal. But even with the known ego the Elites have, it was still a formidable foe, almost outwitting John. And about the fully functioning armor, what are talking about exactly? From what I remember everything worked fine untill the engagement where the Elite damaged the shield generator.
From what I remember, all the humans that ambushed Thel were described as marines with their ''olive drabs''. It dosent have to be naval crew who would have to take care of the nav database. Anyone on board should know how to delete the databases. Anyone. The executable worm was in every navigation system of every ship, and is described in the Cole Protocole.
Plural? I'll take your word for it. I havent read Cole Protocole in a long time. And without the books, I'm basing eveything off memory.