Hey guys, thanks for the overwhelmingly positive response to that analysis! I wanted to try and respond to and compile everything that everyone contributed, but you guys wrote a lot so here's a new thread. Most of the cool ideas centered around the implications for the larger plot, and I've got a few that no one posted yet. I'll credit you where appropriate. It will be broken into these sections: 1. The Darkness 2. The Last City 3. The Traveler and the Fallen 4. The Guardians 1. The Darkness First of all DJenser contributed a much more complete analysis of some of the acronyms relating to computer science (as well as a more in-depth [than the neogaf review] look at the literary/historical references). A few stood out to me: [quote] NP-Hard means "Non-deterministic Polynomial-time hard". The term comes from theoretical computer science's theory of computational complexity. The underlying basis is that any computational problem is one that can be analyzed and solved by a computer or otherwise by mechanical implementation of computational steps, such as an algorithm. A problem that is "NP-Hard" is at least as difficult as the hardest problem in Non-deterministic Polynomial time. "TCC" could indicate a certain complexity class for the Event. "OCP" comes from the "Culture" series by Iain Banks. It stands for "Outside Context Problem", which means a problem that is not (indeed cannot be) considered until it occurs. It is the kind of problem "most civilizations would encounter just once, and which they tended to encounter rather in the same way a sentence encountered a full stop."[/quote] This suggests that, even though these observers were scientifically advanced enough to detect sterile neutrinos and gravity waves [spoiler](though the gravity wave detection may actually be a better indicator of just how powerful the wave was, especially if it remained at a detectable amplitude the full 0.3 seconds, as that would indicate a distortion that was at least: 299,792,458 meters / second* X 0.3 second= 89,937,737.4 meters Which is just over 7 times the diameter of the Earth. ) *Gravity waves, should they exist, would move at the speed of light) [/spoiler] , they still had no idea what they were looking at when it came to this event. Many have suggested (including the original neogaf review) that this excerpt is likely from the beginning of the event that knocked humanity out of their Golden age, and I tend to agree. That also leads into the next section: 2. The Last City There is another Grimoire on "The Dark Age" immediately following the Traveler being knocked down. Interestingly, it's image shares the same dark circle of geometric shapes that "The Darkness" card does, which we may come to learn is an indicator that the card's contents are concerned with long-passed events. [spoiler] “No one knew what had happened to the Traveler. No one understood what had happened to the world. But they heard the whispered call.” They came from the wild lands, gathering in secret enclaves, slipping through the howling ruins of shattered cities, hoping to find the coast, find a ship, pick up the trail of an impossible dream. From the deep black came the Awoken, their eyes haunted. Exos marched in the refugee columns, cloaked in moss and shattered memories. And among them came the Ghosts, beginning their search. It was a time of vast suffering and terrible evil. But there was one hope: the promise of a refuge beneath the Traveler.[/spoiler] It's clear that the civilizations of the solar system were knocked down to nothing when this event happened. Their resurgence is thanks to the Traveler, but this resurgence seems a bit odd. Those we've seen in the tower seem almost primitive in a lot of ways. It's been said that any sufficiently advanced technology will look like magic to those who don't understand it, but these humans have taken that right down to wearing robes and cloaks. Instead of seeing computers lining the observatory we see old books and steam-punk-esque structures. While there was likely always a significant gap between the Traveler's knowledge and Humanity's, I don't exactly see "The Speaker" being the type of person to turn around and start rattling off computer science and particle physics terms. I take this as pretty clear evidence the first Grimoire is as old as we think, but it does raise interesting questions about why humanity seems to have regressed in a few ways. Grumpymoose highlighted this portion of the Grimoire: [quote]Cauterize public sources to SECURE ISIS and harden for defensive action.[/quote] The neogaf review suggested that ISIS may be the Traveler, though either way it seems to be something the public had access to. We don't know enough to be suspicious of anyone yet, but I do wonder if the people of The Last City are still restricted from accessing information or technology. I can't really speculate as to why, but given the ambiguity of the Traveler's purpose in our system, what followed it, and how deep in the dark we are now, I feel there's reason to be critical of everything we're told in these early days. 3. The Traveler and the Fallen Several people in the last thread have been speculating the reasons as to why the other races are in our solar system. There are a lot of good theories, but I think the Fallen in-particular are most interesting. Looking at them, they don't look too different than Guardians. A lot of Ceramic/Plastic looking material (I think it may be called Plasteel in-game, check your inventory if you broke down Titan armor), cloacks, capes, and stylized appearances. In addition, they disintegrate into light when killed, in a manner not too different from how guardians die and are reborn from their Ghosts. It too seems odd that a race would construct such specific (four arms, bipedal) sets of armor if they were naturally made of light or gas. This could lend credence to the theory that The Fallen (as does their name) were a race that the Traveler previously tried to employ against the Darkness. 4. The Guardians Something I've been wondering lately is what exactly the Traveler hopes to gain by sending Guardians out to the lost worlds. If The Darkness really is a massive reality bending force, foot soldiers don't seem like the best tool to use against it. I believe the Guardians are being sent so that they may find something the Traveler is looking for. It is possible that The Fallen scavenging the old worlds are looking for it as well (perhaps to win back its favor?). If I had to bet money, I'd say that part of it is going to involve an AI. Cortana Five wrote a great analysis awhile back that lays out a pattern Bungie has been following since the early nineties. It should come full circle in 2014. [url]http://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/3440571[/url] I won't spoil too much (you should read it), but the AIs name will likely be a derivative of Joyeuse. The fact that we've learned that there's a location on Mars called Charlemagne's Vault indicates it will be found there, and it's also worth noting that Durandal (the equivalent AI from Marathon) also came from Mars. I won't say more, go read it. The last wild card is the Vex. These time-traveling robots don't seem to have much of a place in the revealed lore yet. Of course, if the Darkness can only be affected by future events (the Acausal thing from the last thread) they may play a key role. As always, thank you for reading! Probably won't hear too much more from me before launch (unless half my Grimoires un-redact themselves...), but I may make a video on something. Way back when, I made a few on some possible references Destiny was making to older Bungie titles. I've noticed a few more (enough to make another video) so I might go for that again. Here are the older ones: [url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3iUQawlMTk[/url] [url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZfSov8CYTo[/url]