how did the shadows manage to kill Kosh?

frogcurry · Post by **frogcurry** » 2005-04-15 05:57pm

The Shadows are non telepathic, they fought several of the ancient wars with their enemies due to their fear as a result of this. The Shadow ship found by humanity was buried as a result of this as I recall.

And given they had fought the vorlons a few times, it makes sense they could kill them with the right tools. They may not perhaps be as bothered to protect themselves against attacks from "lesser" enemies since they don't usually fight them, whereas the Vorlons encounter them more and so take more precautions.

Post by **NecronLord** » 2005-04-15 06:03pm

frogcurry wrote:The Shadows are non telepathic, they fought several of the ancient wars with their enemies due to their fear as a result of this. The Shadow ship found by humanity was buried as a result of this as I recall.

Did this perchance come from B5wars?

They take Lyta over bodily. They're telepathic. Not really much more to say.

Rye · Post by **Rye** » 2005-04-15 06:38pm

They appear to be telepathic to me; like when they called out to the people on the white star bridge with "the Eye," plus they must've been controlling those telepaths in their ships somehow.

frogcurry · Post by **frogcurry** » 2005-04-15 07:16pm

It might be.... I don't actually know where that particular stuff comes from, . Its just what came up in the internal search when I thought "Shadows... telepaths". I assumed it was something from the show but if it ain't then ignore it.

The telepaths might have been controlled by something else implanted or brainwashed (like whathisname who served them might have been), and they may have been using technology to replicate telepathic effects. I wouldn't say that it proves it - you'd need to show that they themselves as people were doing something telepathic. I can't think of anything for this...

Nephilim · Post by **Nephilim** » 2005-04-15 07:49pm

NecronLord wrote:
frogcurry wrote:The Shadows are non telepathic, they fought several of the ancient wars with their enemies due to their fear as a result of this. The Shadow ship found by humanity was buried as a result of this as I recall.
Did this perchance come from B5wars?

They take Lyta over bodily. They're telepathic. Not really much more to say.

No, it doesn't. If anything, B5Wars agrees with you, the Shadows are telepaths are at least on the same level as Vorlons and if they are piloting their own ships they cannot be jammed by any younger race telepath.

Obviously, in the current era, Shadows don't pilot their ships. So that's why they're vulnerable to telepathic interferance, now

mr friendly guy · Post by **mr friendly guy** » 2005-04-15 09:26pm

dworkin wrote:Nobody expects the Shadows! Our chief weapon is surprise...surprise and fear...fear and surprise.... Our two weapons are fear and surprise...and ruthless efficiency.... Our *three* weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency...and an almost fanatical devotion to the Chaos.... Our *four*...no... *Amongst* our weapons.... Amongst our weaponry...are such elements as fear, surprise.... I'll come in again

Nobody expects the Shadows! Amongst our weaponry are such diverse elements as: fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, an almost fanatical devotion to the Chaos, and nice spiky ships - Oh damn!

Kosh was killed with a comfy chair

Except Kosh did expect some form of retaliation. He told Sheridan there would be a price for Vorlon aid. Sheriden said he was willing to pay it, failing to realise Kosh was refering to himself (not Sheriden) paying the price.

Post by **NecronLord** » 2005-04-16 10:46am

Yes. But the shadows themselves are telepathic. A P5 even going near them causes the teep to scream and faint remember.

SCVN 2812 · Post by **SCVN 2812** » 2005-04-16 12:32pm

Its worth mentioning that Kosh was also outnumbered. I distinctly remember at least two shadows going into his quarters. Seeing as one side or the other hasn't wiped the other out, neither one is decisively stronger enough in battle to overcome their fear of death. By that logic, a Vorlon and a Shadow should be more or less on par with each other but two Shadows against one Vorlon is a very likely Vorlon death.

Most of the action that I remember the Shadows were using their spikey limbs to attack Kosh. The Shadows also being for lack of a better term, energy based creatures, should have little trouble killing a Vorlon and vice versa. When the Shadows went into Kosh's quarters they decloaked, suggesting they either wanted Kosh to see what was comming even though he could probably sense it telepathically anyways, and / or they needed the extra power to penetrate Kosh's suit.

Post by **NecronLord** » 2005-04-16 04:17pm

It was three of them.

Nephtys · Post by **Nephtys** » 2005-04-16 04:20pm

NecronLord wrote:It was three of them.

Was it explicitly stated as three? We didn't get very good shots of the room in that Ep.

Coalition · Post by **Coalition** » 2005-04-16 09:47pm

There were three with Morden at all times. The view from the security station only caught two of them.

As for not using their stealth? Kosh can see them anyway, so stealth is not needed. Channel all the power to cracking Kosh then. Kosh is outnumbered 3:1, the Shadows and him are both telepathic, and both have a similar tech capability.

Not to mention that Kosh wanted to apologize to Sheridan, based on the dream. So that was diverting some of his strength. Kosh knew he would get killed, and wanted to correct one of his faults.

Vertigo1 · Post by **Vertigo1** » 2005-04-17 01:56am

Rye wrote:They appear to be telepathic to me; like when they called out to the people on the white star bridge with "the Eye," plus they must've been controlling those telepaths in their ships somehow.

The telepaths flying the ships were controlled with the implants IIRC. As for "the eye", we saw that in an earlier episode when Ivanova was plugged into the great machine. She almost couldn't break the connection.

Eframepilot · Post by **Eframepilot** » 2005-04-17 04:38am

Stupid question: Can the Shadows phase to intangibility? Because with three of them around Morden at all times, you would think that someone would accidentally bump into them eventually.

Omega18 · Post by **Omega18** » 2005-04-17 04:57am

Eframepilot wrote:Stupid question: Can the Shadows phase to intangibility? Because with three of them around Morden at all times, you would think that someone would accidentally bump into them eventually.

Not such a stupid question. There always was the question of whether the Shadows were actually there or not, or if they were simply some sort of mental projection. In particular there was the debate about whether the Centauri guards with their special guns actually killed the Shadows around Morden, or simply drove them away for awhile.

As far as the debate about telepathic abilities of the Shadows go, the episode "In the Shadow of Z'ha'dum" has a scene where Talia tries to scan Mr. Morden, she ends up screaming and collapsing on the spot, being completely unsucessful in her scan. She also seeing the vague outlines of two Shadows for a moment, strongly implying the Shadows are responisble for what just happened to Talia.

Post by **NecronLord** » 2005-04-17 06:13am

Eframepilot wrote:Stupid question: Can the Shadows phase to intangibility? Because with three of them around Morden at all times, you would think that someone would accidentally bump into them eventually.

JMS claims they can't, and that they have to scamper around anyone who walks past Morden.

Rye · Post by **Rye** » 2005-04-17 08:49am

Vertigo1 wrote:The telepaths flying the ships were controlled with the implants IIRC.

As far as I know, that's never stated. I got the impression that the implants were more for interfacing with the ship (as they also interfaced with earthforce tech). Add to that how they weren't controlled by shadows when one got out on b5, and when they were used as weapons against the earthforce ships, and when they put one in that shadow ship on Titan. They had to be telepaths for a reason, and telepathic interference worked on them for a reason.

The fact the shadows had something on the same level of "the great machine" of Epsilon 3 could make controlling a fleet by of telepaths by telepathy fairly simple, no?

As for "the eye", we saw that in an earlier episode when Ivanova was plugged into the great machine. She almost couldn't break the connection.

Yes, and she was a telepath and that thing dominated her mind. Like it did with the people on the whitestar, and like it does, i believe, with the conditioned telepaths inside shadow vessels.

Crown · Post by **Crown** » 2005-04-17 01:46pm

The Technomage series clearly implies Shadow's as being telepathic. They are the ones that mind fuck the humans who are to be put in their ships to begin with. They do it so well that a human P12 cannot reverse it, and the Shadow's can't even reverse it, just sort of 're build it', IIRC.

Nevermind the fact that the books describe how Kosh v 1.0 dies, and it is the Shadow's 'spinning light whips from their eyes' gabbing pieces of Kosh's conscienceness and tearing it appart and flinging it out. Pray tell how they can do this, without telepathy?

Post by **NecronLord** » 2005-04-17 01:49pm

Crown wrote:Nevermind the fact that the books describe how Kosh v 1.0 dies, and it is the Shadow's 'spinning light whips from their eyes' gabbing pieces of Kosh's conscienceness and tearing it appart and flinging it out. Pray tell how they can do this, without telepathy?

You go to hell for using that tripe as evidence. You go to hell and you die.

Crown · Post by **Crown** » 2005-04-17 01:52pm

NecronLord wrote:
Crown wrote:Nevermind the fact that the books describe how Kosh v 1.0 dies, and it is the Shadow's 'spinning light whips from their eyes' gabbing pieces of Kosh's conscienceness and tearing it appart and flinging it out. Pray tell how they can do this, without telepathy?
You go to hell for using that tripe as evidence. You go to hell and you die.

Besides its wank, I liked it. It was a good story.

But don't blame me for using it as evidence, blame JMS who has given it enough status such that it can be used as evidence.

Post by **NecronLord** » 2005-04-17 02:06pm

Crown wrote:But don't blame me for using it as evidence, blame JMS who has given it enough status such that it can be used as evidence.

I do. In my divine plan, he's spending a century in purgatory just for the DBZ scene in LotRangers.