Talk:Fall of Reach

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Merge with "Raid of Reach"

Main article: Halopedia:Requests for Merger/Raid of Reach - March 2010

-- Forerunner 15:41, July 30, 2010 (UTC)

Dates retconned?

It seems we have a new, quite large retcon in our hands. According to the ONI Memorial in ODST, the dates for the battle are radically different from what we're used to. Now, that could be chalked up to error or the fact the plaque is just an easter egg, but now, we have new evidence supporting the change: the newest live action trailer shows the date "July 23rd 2552", which wouldn't make any sense in the original context (that is, if the battle began on August 30th). Considering how the date for the beginning of the battle was July 25th in the ONI plaque, the 23rd is probably the day before the invasion. That still leaves one day in between, but that may be the when the Covenant "advance force" arrived and the actual, full-on invasion hadn't yet began.

The new version is also supported by the note in the game's packaging, read by Brian Jarrard in the Reach unpacking video. "You are in possession of the most complete and accurate account that anyone has been able to assemble from the SPECWAR/GroupTHREE/Noble actions during the final weeks before the Covenant glassed Reach."

"Final weeks" wouldn't make a whole lot of sense were the game follow the original story, as most of the planet was glassed the day it was invaded. It seems they changed it to allow for a longer campaign (I saw this coming, really; if it were like the original, the campaign would've lasted for only a couple of hours). In light of this obvious retcon, should we change the page accordingly? --Jugus (Talk | Contribs) 10:39, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

Hm, it seems that way alright. However, that would be a very large retcon indeed; the dates of Halo: Combat Evolved, Halo: First Strike, and indeed most of the dates in The Fall of Reach, including the Battle of Sigma Octanus IV and the entire time line of the Fall of Reach, are all dependent on when the Fall of Reach took place. For instance, the Battle of Sigma Octanus IV took place on July 17th-18th, which would place it a mere five days before the Fall of Reach if this is indeed a retcon; which would make little sense considering the time it would take the Iroquois to make it back to Reach, and the subsequent events such as the recalling of the Spartans and so on. This would also apply to the Battle of Installation 04; where it is explicitly stated that it took three weeks for the Autumn to get to Halo, and that the battle was in late September. And while I won't go into First Strike, I'm sure you know the magnitude of inconsistencies that would arise there, with the Slipspace time anomaly and all. So, my point is, that we should not jump to the conclusion of a date retcon until we are absolutely sure that this is the case; i.e. when Reach comes out. - File:Black Mesa.jpg Halo-343 (Talk) (Contribs) (Edits) 11:09, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

Yep, I'm aware of this - However, it's possible that in this new timeline, the invasion was more gradual (somewhat akin to the Battle of Earth), with smaller battle groups arriving over the span of a month. The final fleet that overwhelmed and glassed Reach would arrive on August 30th like it did before. From then on, the events would transpire much like they did in FS. That's my guess anyways. The events in The Fall of Reach may have happened on the dates they did in the book, including the Iroquois arriving at Reach and John being debriefed, and later receiving his armor, only with the battle going on all that time. The PoA would jump away on the last day of the battle (August 30th), when the actual glassing fleet arrived and the last of the UNSC's defenses were destroyed.

That still leaves a lot of inconsistencies with the book, including the Spartans' mission to capture the Prophet: why would they be sent away when they would all be needed on Reach more than ever? Although it could be understood as an act of desperation: they already know Reach is going to fall, and they send the Spartans to take the fight to the Covenant instead of sacrificing them in a vain effort to defend Reach. Still, that doesn't explain why the PoA turns back and the Spartans are deployed to defend the generators, but it seems to be the only way to make any sense out of it. But I agree that we should keep it the way it is until we get more information and a solid confirmation on the retcon. --Jugus (Talk | Contribs) 11:33, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

The first paragraph of your comment reflects what I thought of the retconned dates. *slashes own comment*

Perhaps capturing a Prophet hostage would buy the UNSC some time as to delaying the inevitable fall of Reach? Like a bargaining chip, perhaps? It makes sense, seeing that it caused quite an uproar when John killed Regret on Delta Halo. Perhaps Reach holds more secret than what we know so far? So many mysteries.... - 5əb'7aŋk^(7alk) 18:40, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure it's a retcon. It seems to me that the planet the Iroquious (and thus the probe) went to just happened to be one the Covenant already knew about. Besides, all we know of the battle is that the components of the Epsilon Eridani fleet defending Reach were eliminated within (I think) 4-6 hours on 30 August. They gradually begin to bombard the planet, finishing (with the exception of Menachite mountain) some time before 15/16 September (the former or the latter being the day the Ascendant Justice reached Reach - the latter being the "revised calendar date" some time after rescuing Halsey, where they work out the correct date). From what I recall, they began glassing from the poles, leaving up to eight days of fighting with surviving UNSC groundforces. I don't remember much about the novel, but I'm sure the PoA simply picked up an emergency transmission addressed to all ships - if you were being attacked, would you personally message each ship individually?-- Forerunner 12:04, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

Uh, I'm not sure you're fully aware of what we're discussing. We're talking about Reach potentially retconning August 30th to July 23rd, I'm not quite sure what you're talking about. - File:Black Mesa.jpg Halo-343 (Talk) (Contribs) (Edits) 12:10, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

It's probably an error. I was saying that if this isn't an error, then the probe attached to the Iroqious obviously wasn't the first to find Reach - perhaps the Skirmishers were sent ahead to look for information regarding other worlds (ie. Earth) before the humans got a chance to wipe the systems. Yeah - it probably meant August instead of July, though it wouldn't mess with the timeline if it was July.-- 12:37, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

No they said they were going to do something that would quote "take issues with" here but in all honestly they've truly screwed the canon up, how the hell does the events in fall of reach still happen if the dates are all wrong. They've essentially taken all the books and flung them out the door. Not just in terms of the events of the game but the events of the books themselves. It's hilarious when you read the last part. Durandal-217 16:11, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

Remember when ODST and Halo Wars trailers were released. Many people looked at the limited content and came to the conclusion that they were non-canon. It turned out that as they obviously hadn't played the game, they couldn't see that it really was canon (Flood in Halo Wars; Regret not destroying New Mombasa, etc.). For all we know, Winter Contingency actually takes place on 23 July, while the rest is on 30-31 August.-- Forerunner 17:35, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

"For all we know, Winter Contingency actually takes place on 23 July, while the rest is on 30-31 August." That makes no sense. Durandal-217 18:22, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

I thought Jugus has already pointed out the obvious approach taken by Bungie to resolve this issue; they had stated that the Fall of Reach occurred earlier than what we already know in Halo 3: ODST through the ONI Memorials. Perhaps those who read the novel took the event too seriously... Maybe the Fall of Reach did occur earlier on in early August after the Iriquois returned to Reach to deliver its report of Octanus. Somewhere during the return, several Covenant ships traced and attacked the planet (which is when the game comes in. It also explains why there weren't many "lightshows" in the Campaign trailer over Reach) but the UNSC on Reach manage to repel the early Covenant forces until they encountered the 700 Covenant ships (which is covered in the novel). Am I wrong? - 5əb'7aŋk^(7alk) 18:33, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

The way I see it, in the new timeline, the actual battle for Reach itself takes place between July 25 and August 29. At first, the Covenant forces come in with smaller groups. On August 30, things happen pretty much like in the novel, except that the Covenant are already on Reach, they just come in with a bigger force, wipe the rest of the UNSC resistance out and glass Reach. The PoA escapes and Red Team goes underground. As for the events that happen in between, like John being debriefed at Camp Hathcock, the briefing for the mission to capture the Prophet in the auditorium and John receiving his Mark V armor, we'll just have to assume the battle for Reach is taking place all that time. Unless, of course, the UNSC managed to destroy the initial Covenant force and it took some time for them to mobilize another one. In that case, there would be a gap in the fighting much like the one that was originally assumed to be between the "first" and "second" battles of Earth.

Judging by the dates shown in the memorial, I'm still fairly certain Halo: Reach will end on August 30 and the time anomaly won't be included. The time anomaly doesn't even affect anything else than the people at Installation 04, causing them to go back in time a couple of weeks when they return to Reach. Events before that shouldn't be affected by the crystal. --Jugus (Talk | Contribs) 18:45, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

Exactly how I view it.- 5əb'7aŋk^(7alk) 18:49, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

So if the Covenant are already on Reach by August 30th explain how NOBODY KNOWS ABOUT IT. It just makes no sense, it's the most moronic thing you could ever come up with in a story, it is loony-toons level ridiculousness. If the Covenant invaded reach on July 25th it would been known throughout the military, no one would be that stupid enough to risk millions of lives on "we need to keep this a secret and build up our military resources". They would have already evacuated the entire planet by that point and nobody would have been that surprised by the real assault by the Covenant as they were in FoR. Durandal-217 19:00, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

The answer is quite simple: the magic powers of retcon. Bungie decided to make the battle longer, so the idea that the invasion happened on August 30th isn't true anymore. According to the new timeline, everyone obviously knows that the Covenant are on Reach by Aug 30 since the battle has been raging for weeks; they're not surprised, except maybe about the massive size of the arriving Covenant fleet.--Jugus (Talk | Contribs) 19:07, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

Look - we know very little about the campaign and the game's plot. What we do know is that Halo: Reach takes place over a longer timeline than just 30 August, and that an advanced invasion force is there days before the Fleet of Particular Justice arrives (personally I think it was a coincidence that Iroqious led them to Reach, if the advanced force was already there). Just wait for the game to come out and we'll understand. We thought that all of Halo Wars would be on Harvest and that there was a second battle of Mombassa in which John participated in. Just wait for more information to come out before turning this into another "bungie fucked up the timeline" discussion.-- Forerunner 19:06, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

Also, it's obvious that it was kept secret - you're the one who's being moronic. Otherwise, nothing would happen on 25 July, let alone 23. -- Forerunner 19:06, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

Let's keep it civil...- 5əb'7aŋk^(7alk) 19:10, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

It just shows me that they are not serious about Halo canon anymore. You don't establish a story and stand by it for 10 years and then at the last second erase what you've stood by. That's just contradicting yourself and it makes you (bungie) look very stupid. That right there is not how you create a universe or tell a good story. What's even more depressing are the people who are willing to stand by this disgraceful move by bungie and go so far as to insult others because of it. Durandal-217 19:18, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

Just pointing out, Bungie didn't write The Fall of Reach. When it comes down to it, Bungie created Halo. While I respect Eric Nylund and still think he's the best Halo writer, it's Bungie's story. I don't like retcons, but complaining about it's not going to help either. And knowing Bungie, they don't just do things like this for no reason. --Jugus (Talk | Contribs) 19:23, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

To Forerunner - it was mentioned in one of the campaign previews that the full-on invasion begins just after Winter Contingency, as the UNSC starts reporting Covenant activity all over the planet through radio. So, keeping the invasion secret from July 23 (or 25) till August 30 isn't really possible. It's a retcon; we'll just have to live with it. On a related note, I'm guessing this hasn't been explained at all in the Fall of Reach reissue? That would've been the perfect chance to change the events of the book when they're retconning it anyways; from what I've heard, they hardly changed it at all. Oh well. An opportunity missed. --Jugus (Talk | Contribs) 19:23, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

I'm sure they've got a good reason, otherwise they wouldn't bother to change it. My question would be then, for now, should this article hold the "newer" information, or the old Fall of Reach date?Tuckerscreator' 19:25, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

I just think its a dishonor to not only the incredible work of Eric Nylund who is a fictional genius in his own right, but it is a dishonor to all of us who stood by Halo. We are not entitled to anything, but we support halo because of its great fiction, gameplay and multiplayer. When all we ask for is a product that continues that foundation, and what we get is a game that on the principle founding of halo (telling a good story) is ignored by throwing out all the work that Nylund, Brannon Boren and Eric S. Trautmann help bungie create is just dishonorable. I believe, or try to believe in honoring people doing incredible work, but when bungie clearly ignores that for the sake of creating what they, and only they want, It just burns my soul. Durandal-217 19:35, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

They're not ignoring Nylund, just adjusting. If they were ignoring Nylund, then they wouldn't have collaborated him him to create this. Changes happen, remember when Miranda Keyes's actress was changed? Best not to get too attached to it, changes happen, and who better to change it than Bungie?Tuckerscreator' 19:52, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

While I acknowledge all the points made, I just can't see it being that there was fighting on Reach weeks before August 30th. Yes, Bungie have retconned before; all minor, and none that affect the overall story. But this is huge, it completely alters the story, and I just don't see Bungie doing that, it would be self-destructive to Halo, and indeed hypocritical, seeing as Bungie have always stood by their creation, and altered it to a minimum. And so many problems arise from this; like why, as Durandal pointed out, practically no one knew that humanity's second most important planet was under Covenant attack for several weeks. ONI are good at covering up; hell, they managed to hide that humanity was on the verge of extinction right up until Earth was attacked, but there's no way they could have hidden a continuous battle on Reach from its own occupants and military defendants. Again, none of us can know exactly what the story is regarding this inconsistency until the game comes out, but if Bungie wanted to make the battle last longer, they had no need to change the dates. A large portion of Reach was left unharmed after the orbital bombardment, and we've never explicitly known how big the portion was; they could have made it as large as they wanted to have a big enough selection of locales to play in, and used all the time from August 30th until September 14th, to set Reach. I can accept an advance invasion force of a day at the most, but as I have said, there's no need for them to change it to weeks. - File:Black Mesa.jpg Halo-343 (Talk) (Contribs) (Edits) 20:24, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

Well, now we know at least that Noble Actual takes place on July 24th, as per this. Winter Contingency presumably takes place later that day, unless it takes almost a day for them to reach Visegrad, which I doubt. There's always the possibility that this is only the advance force and the actual battle won't begin in a long while, but I wouldn't get my hopes up. --Jugus (Talk | Contribs) 12:21, August 19, 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I just saw that too. I'm groping for straws here, but the only redeeming possibility I can think of, is that the next mission, or maybe the one after that takes place on August 30th a few weeks later; the advance invasion force has been taken out, and the true invasion begins on the correct date, with the UNSC ready for them. Again, I don't know, but I really hope this isn't the gigantic retcon it seems to be. - File:Black Mesa.jpg Halo-343 (Talk) (Contribs) (Edits) 12:35, August 19, 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. It would be the single biggest retcon in the Halo universe, ever; it would basically de-canonize The Fall of Reach's chapters 24 through 37, plus require major changes in First Strike and possibly The Flood. Not a good idea at all, considering how it wouldn't even be really necessary in order to tell a different story about the events of Reach. Let's just hope it'll be the way you said; that there's actually an over a month long gap between the comm relay mission and the actual invasion. Then again, that seems unlikely considering some hints in magazine coverage. Also, it would be difficult, not to mention unreasonable, to keep the presence of Covenant forces on Reach secret from most of the population for over a month. If an advance force really arrived that early, they would've had plenty of time to evacuate the planet. --Jugus (Talk | Contribs) 12:44, August 19, 2010 (UTC)

Uh...you guys do know this is a planet we're talking about? In space? Notice that the Covenant team is taking out the communications relay. The place of communications. Want to know why Reach couldn't call for help and no one outside found out about the invasion? The Covenant destroyed the communications. The planet would have been evacuated? Are you crazy? Do you understand how big a logistical operation moving 700 million people off an entire planet would be? Never mind the 350 Covenant ships in orbit. How do you even know that the population didn't know the Covenant had arrived? Maybe that gap was spent building up defenses and arming everyone.

You guys are going rabidly crazy over what a "complete disrespect and betrayal" this is to Eric Nylund and go on about what you're "owed" from Bungie...I mean, I'm not saying I disliked Nylund or his books, but how good of a game could they have gotten just from following the books' Reach storyline? It would have been a disappointment. This is supposed to be the great climactic battle of the entire war...Nylund's portrayal of it was a letdown. The space battle rocked, don't get me wrong, but the ground actions were barely worth noting. Making the Reach invasion a month long lets it be Epic. I mean, how long have we been waiting for a gigantic battle between the humans and Covenant over an entire planet? Maybe everyone should be a bit grateful for this Flayer92 21:05, August 19, 2010 (UTC)

They did it with Coral — and you've got a month to evacuate as many as you can, it can be done. The point you make however is completely off center, there is absolutely no logical reason to change the dates, you could have still done Reach with all this NOBLE team bullshit and not change anything. You also letting blind fanboynisum get the better of your judgement, the fact is that there was no war on Reach, their entire military fleet in orbit was destroyed in less then thirty-minutes, their ground forces stood no change against the Covenant, that's why there was no battle. There is no way they could last a month against a technologically advanced race of aliens, because all they have to do is get in their ships and bombard the planet from orbit and that the beauty of Nylund's work, He Makes Sense. Durandal-217 01:33, August 20, 2010 (UTC)

Theory on dates

I have a different thoery/idea that may or may not have been explained. In the first Remember Reach short, the soldiers and their superiors at HQ were only talking about Insurrectionists. We know that prior to Reach, their activity had been quite sporadic and their forces hadn't been seen in large numbers. However, what if the July 23rd, 2552 date refers to the beginning of a campaign on Reach in response to a resurgence in Insurrectionist activity in the inner colonies, whereas the August 30th date refers to the initial invasion of the Covenant's Fleet of Particular Justice? For those who've seen the footage from GamesCon 2010, you can see that the battle taking place in the background of the opening cinematic has been removed and the plot of it revolves around reports of Innie activity around a comm relay.

Adding in the dates from the Memorial at ONI Alpha Site in Halo 3: ODST, it could be surmised that the UNSC High Command didn't know of further activity from their forces on Reach, leading them to believe that the Covenant swept through the colony in just a single day. This is supported by the meeting in HIGHCOM Facility Bravo in Sydney in the first days of September where COL James Ackerson informs the Admiralty that Reach has been lost and no efforts should be undertaken to rescue survivors. In addition, First Strike proves that forces were still active on Reach in late September. Then again, this is just some batshit insane speculation. :)

Have a good one and please tell me if there's anything I missed or screwed up on!

Rawr,
User:CommanderTony/Sig

That seems a reasonable theory. I guess none of us realized it never explicitly referred to the Covenant being the enemy on Reach for those dates. Right or wrong, it's more reassuring that it could simply be Microsoft screwing up rather than Bungie turning canon upside-down. - File:Black Mesa.jpg Halo-343 (Talk) (Contribs) (Edits) 20:49, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

As a guess, it's as good as any. I guess it's pointless to debate this until the game is out since the discussion will go nowhere with the info we currently have - all we can do is speculate (not to say there's anything wrong with it). I'll just hold on to the hope they'll keep the retcons to a minimum and what I described above doesn't turn out to be true. --Jugus (Talk | Contribs) 20:57, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

It's a good theory, but the problem just snaps back to the retcon. If they've really changed the dates, it opens a big wound for anyone to dig in and rip out vital things. If Reach didn't fall on August 30th then who's to say that whole section in Fall of Reach ever happened, because despite that Halsey is speaking with Auntie Dot, people get the impression she is talking to/about Cortana in some form. It just becomes so much more easier for somebody with enough persuasion to completely void the novel. And it extends into First Strike as well, because its already implied that Halsey knows NOBLE Team is a bunch of S-IIIs, it just begins a domino effect that potentially can destroy everything everyone has worked on for the past decade. So even though you point out Ackerson's discussion in First Strike anyone could, again potentially bring the point out that it never happened.

And the other question becomes as Jugus mentioned earlier, if they really have changed the dates why didn't they establish that in the re-release of FoR it would have been the perfect opportunity to correct halo canon, but they didn't which again continues to show either a level of incompetence or just showing that they don't care. Durandal-217 21:50, August 18, 2010 (UTC)