Talk:Covenant separatists

Needed

As per past discussions here, I am still reluctant to have a Covenant separatists article as I believe the information can be effectively summarized elsewhere. The terminology indicates that the Sangheili were a unified faction following the Great Schism, when they never were, nor are they now. I'd personally think it is better to focus on confirmed factions of Sangheili following the Schism, rather than thinking that they were a united force. --NightHammer^{(talk)(contribs)} 03:30, March 27, 2019 (EDT)

I'm much of the same opinion. The time between the changing of the guard and the end of the Covenant empire as an entity is so short and confusing that I'm not a fan of just labelling every sangheili faction a separatist, especially when they never intended to leave the Covenant and some groups wished to continue the Prophets' work once the minor issue with the brutes was dealt with. I think the existing Covenant remnants page is a much better resource for cataloguing groups seen here + others like the Banished. BaconShelf (talk) 05:34, March 27, 2019 (EDT)

Agreed. The whole notion that the Sangheili were ever a united front was always a fan assumption, which has been more or less disproven by canon ever since Ghosts of Onyx gave us Xytan and his attempts to revive the Covenant. I also echo the sentiment that the label "separatist" is misleading considering most Sangheili had no intention of leaving, merely reforming the Covenant under Sangheili leadership (even the Arbiter spoke of restoring honor to the Covenant during Halo 3) - which also creates a more natural continuity to the various self-entitled "Covenants" post-war than pretending like all Sangheili were ever part of a unified "separatist" movement and then some of them becoming bad guys again. The Covenant remnants page is a better place for all these factions than artificially separating the imaginary "The Good Aliens™ during the Schism" group from everybody else. The Great Schism was a complicated situation, and most parties involved probably didn't even have a full picture of what was going on, so it's much better to leave the categorization more broad and high-level. --Tacitus (talk) 05:45, March 27, 2019 (EDT)

I think the page is helpful, things like terminology can be edited and changed rather than removing the page altogether. We're a wiki, anyone is welcome to edit content to improve it.

The separation between separatists and remnants doesn't imply "Good Aliens" vs "Bad Aliens" as Joyous Exultation Covenant, who were hostile to humanity while also opposing the Covenant empire led by Truth, are listed under separatists. It shows the distinction between Great Schism era groups who dealt with the betrayal from the High Prophet of Truth, and post-war remnants who have vastly different motives. Halopedia is using Covenant remnants for all groups existing after the Covenant's dissolution, but conflicts during the Great Schism were fundamentally different, hence separatists are a blanket term for the Sangheili-led groups forced out of the Covenant during that time. If terminology is crucial, we can always change the name Covenant separisits (from the outdated Halo Encylopedia) to something like Covenant outcasts, or anything else that would give a better implication. They were all forced out by the High Prophet of Truth, separating them from Truth's Jiralhanae-led Covenant. As Covenant remnants are a categorization term for factions unaffiliated, Covenant separatist can be used the same way.

If the issue is that it implies the Sangheili were a united front too much, we can edit the article to make it more like the Covenant remnants page so that the various groups are more segregated.Editorguy (talk) 09:21, March 27, 2019 (EDT)

Naming?

Following your comment Tacitus, perhaps we can all think of a more suitable name or use context sensitive names on redirect links, one that doesn't give the implication that separating from the Covenant was voluntary. Covenant separatists is the only name used in an official context (Halo Encyclopedia, which is now outdated) and was used in a Canon Fodder write up by GrimBrotherOne but he changed separatists to Sangheili rebels (https://www.halowaypoint.com/en-us/news/bounty-hunters). Perhaps Sangheili rebels is a suitable name? Editorguy (talk) 11:28, March 27, 2019 (EDT)

"Rebels" is more fitting than "separatists", but we also know that these groups had more than Sangheili in them; otherwise there would be no point in having them as a page separate from the Sangheili one. If I had to call the page something, the best I can come up with is "Great Schism rebels" or "Great Schism insurgents", which both limits the usage to the Great Schism (as the Covenant saw numerous rebel, insurgent and separatist movements over the course of its history) and removes the implication that they were Sangheili-exclusive. Still, I would dispute the need to have an umbrella page for factions within such a narrow timeframe, considering that, for all we know many of the Covenant remnants post-war could well have had their origins in the Schism era. --Tacitus (talk) 14:56, March 27, 2019 (EDT)

I'd argue that rebels isn't much better, as it implies the Sangheili are rebelling against something when they were effectively being stripped of citizenship of the Covenant. I think it would be better to keep the contents of this page on articles like the Great Schism, Sangheili, Covenant, and Fleet of Retribution/Xytan's Covenant. --NightHammer^{(talk)(contribs)} 15:28, March 27, 2019 (EDT)

I think that despite the time frame being narrow, the events were fleshed out deep enough and were a critical period in Halo's lore, with the universe and motivations being in a very different state than post-war. Great Schism rebels makes more sense than Covenant separatists, I think it works well. A few alternates I thought of as food for thought:

• Sangheili-led rebels
• Covenant exiles
• Great Schism exiles

Editorguy (talk) 18:43, March 27, 2019 (EDT)