Halo 3: Cortana, Gravemind and other questions

[Balrog]

Yeah it's been awhile, but I've replayed the game recently and hopefully some Haloite has discovered the answers by now.

• What exactly are Cortana's "visions" that you receive throughout the game? Flashbacks seems unlikely, but if she's transmitting them technologically then how? And why is it the first time you receive one your vitals flash KIA according to the marines?
• How exactly does the Gravemind's talk to you? I always assumed that it could because it's psychic, but if was then should it not have been able to do more than send threatening messages in iambic pentameter?
• How did Cortana sneak her message aboard the Flood ship that crashed into Voi? And why didn't the Gravemind pick up on this fact and intercept it before you can?
• Hell, how did the Elites know that she was on the Flood ship?
• This last one is a bit more of a criticism, but why was boarding High Charity so "easy?" Yeah you can't make it too difficult for the player's sake, but you delve into the very heart of the beast and the best it can do is throw waves of Floodites at you? Even the sphincter doors automatically open for you. Why no big Tentacles of Doom dropping down from the ceiling to grab you? Why no rooms being flooded with acid trying to dissolve you? Why not use the magical-mass-from-nowhere effect to change the floorplan up, close off entryways, create dead-ends, force Master Chief to blast his way through with high explosives? Presumably the Gravemind could have done this with no problem, so why not?

[Vehrec]

Some people think that all the messages were sent by the Gravemind, I for one am a tad suspicious of that. Some of them seem to do nothing to further Gravemind's purpose at all, some retard it. The Halo EU also has a single incident of Cortana using Covenant technology to send a signal to Earth from Delta Halo, a signal using technology that Earth can receive signals from but cannot replicate or understand. So there is a technological precedent in universe for this sort of thing.

How did the elites know she was there? Again, she might have sent some sort of signal to them. Something was certainly being broadcast by that module, you pick up on it. And Gravemind, vast terrible and arrogant, might not have cared-he/they might have even wanted her to tell the Elites about the Ark and Truth's plans for the galaxy so they would soften him up and pave the way for the Flood to attack both forces and assimilate them.

As for that last point... Yeah, there were quite a few disappointing things in Halo 3. They could have done so much more-but they wanted to keep it more or less within the same basic concept as all their other work, and it showed.

[Stark]

MC clearly suffers from PTSD.

Can anyone explain when when the Gravemind has you right there, it basically lets you go?

[Darksider]

MC clearly suffers from PTSD.

Can anyone explain when when the Gravemind has you right there, it basically lets you go?

Erm. Which time? I seem to remember that happening a lot.


Turns out Gravemind doesn't read the evil overlord list.

[Stark]

Oh uh... the time you meet the Prophet and silly Admiral Girl is there (and has no hitpoints)? You're on a high level, the Gravemind is suddenly all around you, and it... just goes away. It really doesn't make much sense to me.

[open_sketchbook]

The Gravemind is like, a kabillion years old, and while he has his own agenda, it may conflict with a desire to see how everything plays out, which makes him hesitant to interfere. I mean, he COULD turn the entirety of the Flood against you and only you at any time; I think that it is inaccurate to say that he and the rest of the Flood have similar goals. While he is a part of them, he is also intelligent and not (as) subject to the compulsion for viral infection the other Flood hold. It is entirely possible that the Gravemind would rather see a good show come out of this then win; after all, as long as he prevents the Halo rings from firing (something he does do) he always has another shot a few thousand years down the line.

[Wing Commander MAD]

It's been awhile since I've played Halo 3 (I still say the original is the best in the series), didn't the Ark kinda go kablooie at the end, and since Gravemind was on it... Were we even given any indication just how old gravemind is? It wouldn't make a whole lot of sense to store a gravemind on the rings (spores/popcorn flood i can kinda see), so I kinda got the impression that our gravemind formed after the first firing. Now who would be responsible for releasing the Flood on Delta Halo (ringwolrd in Halo 2) is another question. I seem to recall some conspiracy theories involving ONI being bandied about due to the amount of human equipment and supplies (such as crates containing field cooking stoves and VX nerve gas) that were present in seemingly too short a time to have come from the ship we arrived on.

When you ask about the Elites knowing Cortana was on the Flood ship, are you referring to the one that crashes in the city and releases all the flood? If I recall correctly, they only followed it to stop the Flood from spreading and didn't know or really even care what was on it, seeing as their plan was to glass earth after it crashed.

[Stark]

The Gravemind is like, a kabillion years old, and while he has his own agenda, it may conflict with a desire to see how everything plays out, which makes him hesitant to interfere. I mean, he COULD turn the entirety of the Flood against you and only you at any time; I think that it is inaccurate to say that he and the rest of the Flood have similar goals. While he is a part of them, he is also intelligent and not (as) subject to the compulsion for viral infection the other Flood hold. It is entirely possible that the Gravemind would rather see a good show come out of this then win; after all, as long as he prevents the Halo rings from firing (something he does do) he always has another shot a few thousand years down the line.

Did you say it makes sense because he's senile? Here I was thinking 'not killing MC so he doesn't kill you and ruin all your plans' was pretty stupid. He'd rather 'see a good show come out'? Where are you getting this?

[Tanasinn]

It could be that being the collective intelligence of the Flood for however long he's been sitting around made him a mite prone to underestimating or simply dismissing lone critters like the chief. That sort of oversight wouldn't exactly be world-ending, when you consider that the Flood's other big foe, the Forerunner, were mind-bogglingly stupid and incompetent.

Frankly, Halo grows increasingly incoherent with each game released plot-wise. It was best when it was ignoring most of the questions and just had a space marine, his witty sidekick, and cargo cult Catholics from planet X.

[Balrog]

Oh uh... the time you meet the Prophet and silly Admiral Girl is there (and has no hitpoints)? You're on a high level, the Gravemind is suddenly all around you, and it... just goes away. It really doesn't make much sense to me.

Yeah, I do remember that. The level is The Ark, you and the Arbiter are surrounded by giant Tentacles of Doom, when suddenly...they disappear, and the waves of Floodites commences. That never made any sense either.

When you ask about the Elites knowing Cortana was on the Flood ship, are you referring to the one that crashes in the city and releases all the flood? If I recall correctly, they only followed it to stop the Flood from spreading and didn't know or really even care what was on it, seeing as their plan was to glass earth after it crashed.

No, they knew she was on. They tell you this the first time they show up, that they're also looking for Cortana, and the second time when they say "we might be looking for your AI, but the Shipmaster has an itchy trigger finger, so hurry the fuck up."

How did the elites know she was there? Again, she might have sent some sort of signal to them. Something was certainly being broadcast by that module, you pick up on it. And Gravemind, vast terrible and arrogant, might not have cared-he/they might have even wanted her to tell the Elites about the Ark and Truth's plans for the galaxy so they would soften him up and pave the way for the Flood to attack both forces and assimilate them.

I thought he didn't know what was on the other side of the portal, according to Cortana's message IIRC. Which would be good enough reason to not let your enemies use it. And if he did, it would still be a terrible idea to let your enemies in through before you, instead of getting there and setting up shop first.

[Chris OFarrell]

I never got how he was able to 'hack' Cortana frankly, she's a frigen comptuer program and he's a Japanese tenticle monster! Its not like he and the flood are Replicators or anything here...

APPARENTLY he was able to SOMEHOW function as some kind of massive parallel computer or something stupid like that, and corrupted the forerunner AI who was leading the war against him. That never made any sense to me, but hey, the HALO story just went plain weird in Halo 3.

[Imperial Overlord]

The Halo story went weird in Halo 1. The whole Halo/Forerunner/Flood bit makes no sense whatsoever.

[Darth Ruinus]

I never got how he was able to 'hack' Cortana frankly, she's a frigen comptuer program and he's a Japanese tenticle monster! Its not like he and the flood are Replicators or anything here...

APPARENTLY he was able to SOMEHOW function as some kind of massive parallel computer or something stupid like that, and corrupted the forerunner AI who was leading the war against him. That never made any sense to me, but hey, the HALO story just went plain weird in Halo 3.

He doesn't hack any of the AIs, he just talks to them. That's something else about Halo I don't understand, why did the Forerunners build an AI that can be talked into joining the enemy?

[Stark]

Same reason as everything else.

Because they're IDIOTS.

[Darksider]

Because they're IDIOTS.

THIS is an epic motherfucking understatement.

The entire reason the Halo universe exists in its current crappy state (Humanity nearly extinct, alien fundies nearly kill off the galaxy twice) is because the Forerunners are completely pants on head retarded.

And still, being as retarded as they were, if their defense had held and the aforementioned AI hadn't gone rogue, they would have beaten the flood.

Turns out incompetence isn't unique to the generation of flood in the current era.

[Stark]

For me, the best part is that the Precursors being so stupid is why people think the Flood is awesome and say things like 'sector-level threat in three days' and other obvious absurdities.

[Ford Prefect]

Hilariously, the Flood's apparently unstoppable power in the past can be chalked up entirely to extremely advanaced technology rather than an ability of the Flood themselves. Extremely common teleportation = easy means of rapid infestation lol.

[Balrog]

I swear, this necromancy has a purpose; please don't kill the zombie just yet.

• How did Cortana sneak her message aboard the Flood ship that crashed into Voi? And why didn't the Gravemind pick up on this fact and intercept it before you can?

Supposedly, the new Halo short story collection Evolutions actually answers this question, but I wanted someone who has the book (or has read it) to confirm what I've heard. Is it true that the Gravemind knew that Cortana was trying to sneak out her message, and actually helped her do so, without bothering to see what was contained in the message? Is there some sane reason why he would do this?

[Night_stalker]

Yeah it's been awhile, but I've replayed the game recently and hopefully some Haloite has discovered the answers by now.

• What exactly are Cortana's "visions" that you receive throughout the game? Flashbacks seems unlikely, but if she's transmitting them technologically then how? And why is it the first time you receive one your vitals flash KIA according to the marines?
• How exactly does the Gravemind's talk to you? I always assumed that it could because it's psychic, but if was then should it not have been able to do more than send threatening messages in iambic pentameter?
• How did Cortana sneak her message aboard the Flood ship that crashed into Voi? And why didn't the Gravemind pick up on this fact and intercept it before you can?
• Hell, how did the Elites know that she was on the Flood ship?
• This last one is a bit more of a criticism, but why was boarding High Charity so "easy?" Yeah you can't make it too difficult for the player's sake, but you delve into the very heart of the beast and the best it can do is throw waves of Floodites at you? Even the sphincter doors automatically open for you. Why no big Tentacles of Doom dropping down from the ceiling to grab you? Why no rooms being flooded with acid trying to dissolve you? Why not use the magical-mass-from-nowhere effect to change the floorplan up, close off entryways, create dead-ends, force Master Chief to blast his way through with high explosives? Presumably the Gravemind could have done this with no problem, so why not?

1. They could be signs that she's going Rampant. You just fell 2 km, I think the suit going to be a little screwy as a result.
2. He's had 100,000 years to evolve some form of long range communication, maybe he hijakced something from Installiation 05
3. She's a AI, and the ship was probably docked at High Charity, so she slipped something onboard.
4. She might've set a beacon to transmit on the UNSC E-Band.
5. Hell if I know, but maybe he just wanted to give Chief a chance at survival. Not a big chance albeit but still a chance.

[Balrog]

Well doesn't really answer my question, hopefully I'll have time to find the book soon; I hear it was written by Traviss *shudder*

5. Hell if I know, but maybe he just wanted to give Chief a chance at survival. Not a big chance albeit but still a chance.

That's just comically Evil Overlordish of him. This thing is suppose to be, like, very smart, no?

[Jake]

#
# This last one is a bit more of a criticism, but why was boarding High Charity so "easy?" Yeah you can't make it too difficult for the player's sake, but you delve into the very heart of the beast and the best it can do is throw waves of Floodites at you? Even the sphincter doors automatically open for you. Why no big Tentacles of Doom dropping down from the ceiling to grab you? Why no rooms being flooded with acid trying to dissolve you? Why not use the magical-mass-from-nowhere effect to change the floorplan up, close off entryways, create dead-ends, force Master Chief to blast his way through with high explosives? Presumably the Gravemind could have done this with no problem, so why not?

1. Depending on the difficulty level, those waves of floodlites can be pretty effective.
2. The master chief is very good at meleeing stuff. If the gravemind didn't let him through, he might have just punched his way in.
3. The master chief is strong enough to punch through a f*cking tank. Tentacles of doom probably wouldn't do much.
4. His shields might block acid.
5. Mass from nowhere?

He doesn't hack any of the AIs, he just talks to them. That's something else about Halo I don't understand, why did the Forerunners build an AI that can be talked into joining the enemy?

The gravemind is like a massive biological hyper intelligent supercomputer. To defeat it, the forerunners had to make a hyper intelligent supercomputer of their own. Being able to make your own decisions (including betraying your creators) comes with hyper intelligence.

[Samuel]

The gravemind is like a massive biological hyper intelligent supercomputer. To defeat it, the forerunners had to make a hyper intelligent supercomputer of their own. Being able to make your own decisions (including betraying your creators) comes with hyper intelligence.

Not at all. For starters all AIs "make their own decisions". You can have them betray you, but it is not an inherent property of super-intelligence, but programming. See Starglider (he is the expert), but alot of problems become easier to solve with more computing power. And intelligent life competes for the necesary components used to increase ones computing power.

[Jake]

I didn't say that all AIs will betray their creators, I just said that if you make something that has to be creative, it will have to be capable of thinking for itself and all of the risks that entails. I might be wrong on this, but I can't think of anything off the top of my head that is creative but not self aware.

[DOOMhammer]

#1the visions from cortana are in fact flash backs, the bluring of the screen is just for jrumatic effect. while the voice is talking about there relation ship.
#2 the flood are telepathic, i am not shore if they can communicat with other species. it might be that becuase of the spartan inhansments the gravemind can talk to john.
#3 cortana is a super AI, and the gravemind is preparing for war he cant watch every thing.
#4 the little canister thing had a beacon on it with a unsc IFF on it.
#5 because the charity ship's army is busy in other parts of the ark to try and fully infect it,and the flood arnt realy about defending things most of there force was out and about

[Balrog]

Having finally found the short, it is as I feared: the Gravemind let her transmit the message, even helped her do so, because he's a Stupid Evil Overlord.

#
# This last one is a bit more of a criticism, but why was boarding High Charity so "easy?" Yeah you can't make it too difficult for the player's sake, but you delve into the very heart of the beast and the best it can do is throw waves of Floodites at you? Even the sphincter doors automatically open for you. Why no big Tentacles of Doom dropping down from the ceiling to grab you? Why no rooms being flooded with acid trying to dissolve you? Why not use the magical-mass-from-nowhere effect to change the floorplan up, close off entryways, create dead-ends, force Master Chief to blast his way through with high explosives? Presumably the Gravemind could have done this with no problem, so why not?

1. Depending on the difficulty level, those waves of floodlites can be pretty effective.
2. The master chief is very good at meleeing stuff. If the gravemind didn't let him through, he might have just punched his way in.
3. The master chief is strong enough to punch through a f*cking tank. Tentacles of doom probably wouldn't do much.
4. His shields might block acid.
5. Mass from nowhere?

C'mon now, let's think about this critically. Even if the shields block acid, they eventually wear out; even if he can punch through a tank (lol), that's going to be harder when your limbs are immobilized, as they were when the Gravemind first captured him in the second game. Shit, why even open the sphincter doors for him, force Master Chief to punch through everything and tire himself out. As for the mass from nowhere, we see constantly throughout the game that people newly infected suddenly increase in size as Flood-y bits and pieces grow out of them. Even ignoring that, it would've made far more sense (and been a much cooler/more challenging level) for the Gravemind, who is in complete control of the environment, to start altering it to try and slow John down.