Poll: Flood (Halo), Replicators (Stargate), or the Borg (Star Trek)?

[Gerazzi]

I have not watched Stargate or Star Trek, only briefly played Halo 3

I don't know whether to feel good or bad for that...

 

[keyton777]

The Flood aren't just dumb animals. Don't forget about the Gravemind.

But they never do anything really intelligent. They don't use tools when the tools would be beneficial. They don't use armor. They don't build things. It sounds like the Gravemind doesn't have fine control over individual Flood beings - it can send them this way or that, but it cannot tell them to close a door or pick up a shovel and dig. If they just built a bunch of ships, they would have owned the galaxy 10 times over.

no, eipok has a point the flood are far from animals, they dont really need a lot of tools, where by just mutating a combat form into what they need is all the reallly would do.

Dude, seriously, don't mean to be a grammar nazi, but. Grammar?

actually, he had a good point, can teh borg assimilate the flood? i can see a drone injecting a single combat form (while getting the bejeesus beaten out of it)but, do the flood have anything that the borg can "infect" in their own little way? (also, i think the flood are at least partially telepathically linked somehow, they fight like a beehive)

Of course the Borg can assimilate a Flood'ed being. The Flood still have a central nervous system, muscles, biological structures. Those structures can be absorbed. Flood spores can be killed, destroying the telepathic abilities and control nodes.

and the borg manufacturing borg thing doesnt make a whole lotta sense, arint the borg cyborgs? (isnt that where they got the name?) if you built a borg it would be a robot, and i think, easier to break.

No, they would clone biological beings, and then implant them with the cybernetic devices.

and they would still be vulnerable to an infection form, and a combat form hits harder than an anti-tank missle going off in front of you, they would pound a drone to bits b4 it had the chance, and if the flood had a form big enough to take on other starships (which they probably do) its purpose built....err grown (?), they alread make ground units that are nearly immune to any weapons.



also, the borg dont REANIMATE a dead body, they just jumpstart whats already there (the heart and brain and all the little servos and stuff) so thats just like bringing a comptuer out of hibernation. The flood actually bring back a body that has been MASSIVLY damaged, to the point where i think the borg would jsut ignore it, and mutate it back to combat readyness, the floods bigest advantage over the borg is their ability to mutate any living organism to what ever form they would need, the energy they would get for the mutation is jsut cell generation, the flood dont need a whole lot of biomatter to make something big.

The Flood aren't just dumb animals. Don't forget about the Gravemind.

But they never do anything really intelligent. They don't use tools when the tools would be beneficial. They don't use armor. They don't build things. It sounds like the Gravemind doesn't have fine control over individual Flood beings - it can send them this way or that, but it cannot tell them to close a door or pick up a shovel and dig. If they just built a bunch of ships, they would have owned the galaxy 10 times over.

the gravemind uses the forms for what they are ment for, combat forms are obviously ment for combat, the carrier forms are basically suicide bombers, in halo 1 they had a form on teh truth and reconciliation that was totally foucused on learning to use that ships control systems,the gravemind can learn how to use other races ships and technology, he learns at and an increadable rate

they are buy no means as dumb as animals, just because they dont use a shovel or body armor, they dont need it


also, to eipok, the flood dont just sever the head, they also use the former owner of the dead body for information, kinda like have someones else mind stuffed into yours and they eat your memories and stuff, the did it to Private Jenkins, and Captain Keys on the first halo when they took him over, it was in the flood book the wrote

 

[Elim Garak]

I believe I've explained more than once that the Flood DON'T have central nervous systems. Every individual Flood cell is capable of thought and they group together to increase processing power. Every individual cell is also capable of muscular movement. In fact every Flood cell is a self-contained organism, capable of doing whatever it needs to.

LOL - I didn't realize the Flood things were that silly. OK, so the Borg would then not be able to assimilate purely created beings. They would be able to assimilate only those that have been simply taken over by the spores. Therefore they would just kill the flood and be done with it.

The Flood's telepathic ability is beyond our science to explain (by which I mean "What the frack do you think you're talking about? control nodes phtshha!").

Lets say they took over a human. They can't instantly convert the entire body into the same type of cells as they are. They would simply gain control over the body's nervous system. Destroy or take over the control nodes that are the interface between the hive mind and the rest of the body, and you have assimilated the flood creature.

Also, spores aren't technically alive and thus cannot be killed (you need to have been alive in order to be dead).

Huh? Define "alive" in that case. They are either machines or living cells. There is no third option. Some things blur the line, but for that you have to go to a virus level.

Besides, anything can be destroyed.

Also, any Borg technological advantage can very quickly become a Flood advantage.

I don't buy it. At best they could take over a sphere or a basic cube. The Borg would simply send a tactical cube instead. Or two. Or ten. Or a thousand. Or a million. Apparently the Flood can barely use what they've got - if they could use them well, they would not have been defeated.

And there is no indication that the Flood could not build ships given the opportunity and motivation (they are never given both in any story in the Halo universe, either they are cut off from resources or have a plentiful supply of ships to take).

LOL. You yourself said that they have had access to ships and/or shipyards. A smart being would have taken a ship into some asteroid belt, sat there for a few years, and built up several million single-person ships. And then sent them all at once against every inhabited planet in the galaxy. There, you are done - you have conquered everything. Are you saying the Flood never had that motivation?

They can manipulate technology very skillfully if required, the Flood infested cruiser in Halo 3 was piloted so precisely that it was able to exit slipspace within the Earth's atmosphere (a remarkable feat given the astronomical number of calculations required to make a ship simply enter slipspace). Or even better, the Flood infested frigate in Halo 2 was able to exit slipspace inside High Charity.

Interesting - and if they are that smart and that precise, why did they loose? Why is any part of the galaxy not Flooded? Are you saying that they completely lack the concept of strategy? Considering how they fight, that would explain some things.

 

[Daveman]

The Flood behave like a fungus. They have spores and their basic structure resembles that of a fungus. The Flood is not a symbiotic collection of species, it's a single species. I don't even know how you could come to the conclusion that it's a collection of species. It's a parasitic species that uses host bodies or pre-existing biomass to grow. It cannot create much biomass on its own.

And how can you think the Halo universe is boring? I think it's pretty damned interesting.

Just look up the definition of species and see if it applies, it doesn't have anything to do with genetics. LIKE a fungus I can accept but you said they ARE a fungus which is clearly wrong. For a start the spores have appendages indicating some sort of specialised tissue which is grouped to form an organ (I think you said they didn't have in an earlier post).

And I find the Halo universe boring because I only ever wanted to play the games and you learn almost fuck all from them. Unlike star trek and stargate which are significantly more win.

 

[Eipok Kruden]

also, to eipok, the flood dont just sever the head, they also use the former owner of the dead body for information, kinda like have someones else mind stuffed into yours and they eat your memories and stuff, the did it to Private Jenkins, and Captain Keys on the first halo when they took him over, it was in the flood book the wrote

They only leave the head intact if the Gravemind thinks the host has something useful in it. The Brain form/proto-gravemind used the minds of Keyes and a number of deckhands to learn how to pilot the ship. But usually, they just push the head back and completely take over the host since not every soldier on the battlefield has important information.

Also, any Borg technological advantage can very quickly become a Flood advantage. And there is no indication that the Flood could not build ships given the opportunity and motivation (they are never given both in any story in the Halo universe, either they are cut off from resources or have a plentiful supply of ships to take). They can manipulate technology very skillfully if required, the Flood infested cruiser in Halo 3 was piloted so precisely that it was able to exit slipspace within the Earth's atmosphere (a remarkable feat given the astronomical number of calculations required to make a ship simply enter slipspace). Or even better, the Flood infested frigate in Halo 2 was able to exit slipspace inside High Charity.

The reason the Flood are such precise pilots is because they use Brain Forms to pilot ships. Brain Forms are composed of a number of pilots and deckhands, people who know how to fly the ship. The Brain Forms are stationary, they're stuck on the deck of the ship. They use tentacles to both keep themselves in place and directly interface with the ship. In that respect, they're like the Capsuleers from EVE. They're directly linked to the ship itself. In effect, once the Brain Form has been planted on the bridge and put its tentacles in place, it IS the ship. It has direct access to the ships CPU, to all of the ships other systems that are accessible from the Bridge, and, most importantly, it is directly linked to the Gravemind itself. Proto-Graveminds are the only forms that are always directly controlled by the Gravemind.

 

[blinkgun96]

The Flood came first too didnt it? I mean before the head crab... not that its relevent.

 

[GoldenRaz]

I think Replicators would win an all-out war between the three. Flood does not have any weapons that could effectively fight the replicators, and the Borg would simply be slowly "devoured". The Replicators can't be assimilated by the others, seeing a how they aren't biological. They can lie dormant for eons(maybe not, but still) and they have the patience to collect all Flood spores and put them in some sort of stasis field or whatever. Also, noone has mentioned that the Replicators can adapt(I know there's a better word for it but I can't think of it right now) to anything, just like the Borg. A couple of blasts from an energy weapon, and they have rendered that weapon useless. A projectile weapon can be rendered useless by simply devouring some kevlar or whatever. Also, the Replicators aren't stupid, they just don't want to fight people unless they prove to be a serious threat.

 

[Eldritch Warlord]

I believe I've explained more than once that the Flood DON'T have central nervous systems. Every individual Flood cell is capable of thought and they group together to increase processing power. Every individual cell is also capable of muscular movement. In fact every Flood cell is a self-contained organism, capable of doing whatever it needs to.

LOL - I didn't realize the Flood things were that silly. OK, so the Borg would then not be able to assimilate purely created beings. They would be able to assimilate only those that have been simply taken over by the spores. Therefore they would just kill the flood and be done with it.

Need I remind you of Star Trek's idea of "alien." Now I'm not blaming the show as they had a budget to consider but they seem to have gotten you stuck in the idea that the only life that can exist is very similar to Earth life.

Concerning Borg assimilation (forgive me for not being a Trekkie), it's done be nanite injection correct? How do they inject the nanites? How do the nanites take over?

The Flood's telepathic ability is beyond our science to explain (by which I mean "What the frack do you think you're talking about? control nodes phtshha!").

Lets say they took over a human. They can't instantly convert the entire body into the same type of cells as they are. They would simply gain control over the body's nervous system. Destroy or take over the control nodes that are the interface between the hive mind and the rest of the body, and you have assimilated the flood creature.

That would only work if the Flood are still in their "feral" or "coordinated" stage of infestation. After a Gravemind arises the Flood don't bother with keeping their hosts alive, and they would very quickly figure out the Borg's modus operandi and start severing host brains to deny them the body (assuming as I do that Borg assimilation requires the person to be living and simply links the brain to the collective).

Also, spores aren't technically alive and thus cannot be killed (you need to have been alive in order to be dead).

Huh? Define "alive" in that case. They are either machines or living cells. There is no third option. Some things blur the line, but for that you have to go to a virus level.

Besides, anything can be destroyed.

It's a matter of technicality; an egg, seed, fruit, or spore is not considered alive because it has no means to reproduce and does not have a metabolic process. Don't concern yourself with it as it has little bearing on this discussion.

Also, any Borg technological advantage can very quickly become a Flood advantage.

I don't buy it. At best they could take over a sphere or a basic cube. The Borg would simply send a tactical cube instead. Or two. Or ten. Or a thousand. Or a million. Apparently the Flood can barely use what they've got - if they could use them well, they would not have been defeated.

No, the Flood is very smart. They won't fight a battle they can't win. The Flood doesn't do ship-to-ship combat anyway, they board enemy vessels. And their favorite way of boarding combat ships is to crash other ships into them. And don't say they'd never be able to, the Flood is more than capable of warp jumping their ship to within a few kilometers of the enemy.

And don't say that's a waste of a ship either, the Flood can repair ships that anyone/thing else would have written off as scrap.

And there is no indication that the Flood could not build ships given the opportunity and motivation (they are never given both in any story in the Halo universe, either they are cut off from resources or have a plentiful supply of ships to take).

LOL. You yourself said that they have had access to ships and/or shipyards. A smart being would have taken a ship into some asteroid belt, sat there for a few years, and built up several million single-person ships. And then sent them all at once against every inhabited planet in the galaxy. There, you are done - you have conquered everything. Are you saying the Flood never had that motivation?

I said the Flood never have both the motivation and ability in any Halo Universe stories. Either they are imprisoned on Forerunner constructs with no metal to speak of save the nigh invulnerable alloy the place is made of (not to mention the Sentinels suppressing them) or they have space faring societies to take over.

They can manipulate technology very skillfully if required, the Flood infested cruiser in Halo 3 was piloted so precisely that it was able to exit slipspace within the Earth's atmosphere (a remarkable feat given the astronomical number of calculations required to make a ship simply enter slipspace). Or even better, the Flood infested frigate in Halo 2 was able to exit slipspace inside High Charity.

Interesting - and if they are that smart and that precise, why did they loose? Why is any part of the galaxy not Flooded? Are you saying that they completely lack the concept of strategy? Considering how they fight, that would explain some things.

The Flood was defeated because the Forerunners did something they did not expect, they killed themselves. And Offensive Bias cleaned up the mess, exterminating the Flood wherever they were not contained.

And the Flood was defeated in the Halo trilogy because they desperately wanted to prevent the galaxy-wide purge from happening again. So they took everything they had to prevent the Covenant from activating the Halo Array on the Ark. And there they were again defeated by the unexpected, the Ark had built a new Halo to replace the one that was destroyed.

That is how the Flood, despite their cunning, power, and manipulations, were defeated; surprise.

EDIT:

The Flood came first too didnt it? I mean before the head crab... not that its relevent.

No, headcrabs were in the original Half-Life.

 

[UsefulPlayer 1]

pfffff......REPLICATORS!

Oh I am such a fanboy....

 

[SargentToughie]

I just have to say that this is the nerdiest thread I've seen in a very long time. I know a lot about the flood, but not enough to defend them to the level that some of you have. I've never seen stargate, and I am relatively familiar with the borg.

But good job not turning this into a flame war... and go flood, win that three way race to eliminate humanity

 

[-Seraph-]

then the replicators come allong and the tech bodies of the borg might be destroyed or the cubes eaten up but then the borg can beat the replicators with the remainder of their organistic being

hmm...NO. First off what you say makes very little to no sense. The borg cannot exist without both organic and machine. If their technology is destroyed they are nothing but useless husks. The borg cannot exist as purely biological because then THEY AREN'T BORG. The replicators have nothing to fear from organic life at all as no living thing can truly pose a threat unless that organic being has some level of tech and even then they can adapt.

Ultimately the borg are the weakest of the 3 as even though they may be a harmony of both technology and machine, they harbor many weaknesses due to this. If one part of the borg is destroyed the other half cannot exist or be considered borg. The other 2 races are pure which gives them an even greater strength.

 

[MariusLecter]

REPLICATORS.

A replicator is a METAL head crab. NUFF SAID.
Replicators would tear apart Borgs and Borg ships making new replicators.
The flood? hahahaha!

 

[oliveira8]

The Flood came first too didnt it? I mean before the head crab... not that its relevent.

Headcrabs made their debut in Half Life 1 in 1998.

 

[Elim Garak]

Need I remind you of Star Trek's idea of "alien." Now I'm not blaming the show as they had a budget to consider but they seem to have gotten you stuck in the idea that the only life that can exist is very similar to Earth life.

LOL, you are right - fair enough.

Concerning Borg assimilation (forgive me for not being a Trekkie), it's done be nanite injection correct? How do they inject the nanites? How do the nanites take over?

The nanites in the latest generation of Borg drones are injected through tubes that come out of a Borg arm - kind-of like Wolverine's claws only long and flexible. And they somehow can penetrate just about everything. Here is a page with a good picture: link [http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Nebula/4156/infirmary/xeno/borg/assimilation.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Nebula/4156/infirmary/xeno/borg.html&usg=__3qnCgsdvyn4hcVSJwgR31Dgc_S4=&h=150&w=200&sz=8&hl=en&start=4&tbnid=cbj-E4S1027ZcM:&tbnh=78&tbnw=104&prev=/images%3Fq%3DBorg%2Bassimilation%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG]. They assimilate by growing implants all over the drone's body that control it and the mind.

That would only work if the Flood are still in their "feral" or "coordinated" stage of infestation. After a Gravemind arises the Flood don't bother with keeping their hosts alive, and they would very quickly figure out the Borg's modus operandi and start severing host brains to deny them the body (assuming as I do that Borg assimilation requires the person to be living and simply links the brain to the collective).

Not quite - the drone doesn't have to be alive. Or the body doesn't. The brain can be replaced - look at the Borg queen, although that's an extreme case.

No, the Flood is very smart. They won't fight a battle they can't win. The Flood doesn't do ship-to-ship combat anyway, they board enemy vessels. And their favorite way of boarding combat ships is to crash other ships into them. And don't say they'd never be able to, the Flood is more than capable of warp jumping their ship to within a few kilometers of the enemy.

At which point the Borg will hit them with a tractor beam and start disassembling the ship for spare parts.

[/quote]And don't say that's a waste of a ship either, the Flood can repair ships that anyone/thing else would have written off as scrap.[/quote]

Wait, if they are so smart then why don't they own the galaxy? Like I said - if they build seed pods and tiny seed ships, and launch them at all the planets at once, they could do it. Especially if they can just warp into the atmosphere and basically start assimilating everybody left and right.

I said the Flood never have both the motivation and ability in any Halo Universe stories. Either they are imprisoned on Forerunner constructs with no metal to speak of save the nigh invulnerable alloy the place is made of (not to mention the Sentinels suppressing them) or they have space faring societies to take over.

You mean the have NO space faring societies to take over? Anyway, at some point they get ships, right? So why don't they take those ships, go hide, and build up the fleet that I just mentioned? I don't see the Flood from your description ever loosing the motivation - just the ability.

 

[ParkourMcGhee]

They would all fail to win against the other. Now throw in Alien, that might get interesting XD.

 

[Eldritch Warlord]

You mean the have NO space faring societies to take over? Anyway, at some point they get ships, right? So why don't they take those ships, go hide, and build up the fleet that I just mentioned? I don't see the Flood from your description ever loosing the motivation - just the ability.

I mean that they do have space faring societies to take over. During the time of the trilogy the Flood move quickly to prevent the Covenant from firing the Halo Array and during the time of the Forerunners they had millions of ships to steal.

And concerning the tractor beam thing, a sufficiently developed Flood colony (it doesn't take more than a day or so to reach this level) can launch dispersal pods. These small pods would get Flood onto the surface of the ship and from there they could get in and start to take over. I don't know if combat forms can survive in a vacuum (though I don't see why they wouldn't without the need to breathe or retain homeostasis) but I know that spores can as pureforms probably can.

Anyway, I think the Flood would win in the long run but the Borg (or Replicators for that matter) would certainly put up a hell of a fight.

 

[keyton777]

1.)Yes, the Flood CAN grow a new being in a few minutes. They don't need to infect a host, infecting hosts just makes it easier since they're already there on the battlefield and hosts and corpses only take 5-10 seconds to mutate and turn into a combat form. That's right, if one infection form gets on the face of a live host or a dead corpse, it only takes 5-10 seconds to turn that host or corpse into a fully functioning and lethal combat form that can utilize whatever weapon the host/corpse was using before the mutation. A video of it happening: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6ekCtDld5w Exactly 11 seconds is the time it takes the infection form to mutate this marine's body and turn him into a human combat form.

Jeez, what a dumb design. Didn't realize it was more fantasy than sci-fi. .

?
are you retarded?
both teh flood and the borg are SCI-FI!
your arguing weather or not to compleatly fictional being can beat each other up?
besides i think your the kinda person that has idolized the borg to the point where your totally biased anyway and your just going to fling what ever idea comes to your head.
read the books, and play the games and PAY SOME FUCKING ATTENTION




also the borg are getting raped in the polls so it doesnt really matter

 

[Elim Garak]

?
are you retarded?
both teh flood and the borg are SCI-FI!
your arguing weather or not to compleatly fictional being can beat each other up?
besides i think your the kinda person that has idolized the borg to the point where your totally biased anyway and your just going to fling what ever idea comes to your head.
read the books, and play the games and PAY SOME FUCKING ATTENTION

also the borg are getting raped in the polls so it doesnt really matter

LOL, learn to spell much? And you are calling me retarded?

 

[keyton777]

?
are you retarded?
both teh flood and the borg are SCI-FI!
your arguing weather or not to compleatly fictional being can beat each other up?
besides i think your the kinda person that has idolized the borg to the point where your totally biased anyway and your just going to fling what ever idea comes to your head.
read the books, and play the games and PAY SOME FUCKING ATTENTION

also the borg are getting raped in the polls so it doesnt really matter

LOL, learn to spell much? And you are calling me retarded?

ok so i cant spell right, woo, your still capable of reading arint you?
come up with something else to say, as it stands, eipok makes a better point than you do.

and the polls dont lie the borg are at the bottom of the stack