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Topic: The Remains of the Precursors (Read 14638 times)
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ErekLich
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One Ring to rule them all, eh you know the rest.
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That's a theoretical point.
Meaning what, you don't concede it?
So from this I delude a few things:
From these two facts I delude that:
Well, I coulda told you you were deluded. All you had to do was ask. 
1. The precursors built some things not to last, of which most are gone, but some of which amzaingly have survived, whereas most have not
1. When building larger installations or objects for long-range agendas, the brecursors did indeed build to last.
Now, we have so far found only a few of these things, but if the Precursors were really as endlessly curious as we hear that htey were, then shouldn't there be more?
And that brings us neatly back to the thread without any more contradictions.
I agree that some things were built to last.
However, I really don't see where you get this idea that there should be more stuff that was built to last.
I'm an engineering major, and let me assure you that more things are designed to wear out than are built to last!
The amount of precursor stuff floating around makes perfect sense to me.
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Oh God, please don't let me die today! Tomorrow would be SO much better!
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Lukipela
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The Ancient One
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Regarding the theoretical point thing, I kinda thought I used the rest of the point on clarifying the reasoning behind it... What I meant was that it is all true and very logic, but that doesn't necessarily make it the right alternative.
By happy coincidence I study engineering as well  And we don't build things to last a 100.000 years that's true, but we do at least attempt to build things that will last a reasonable amount of time, until they are worn out. But I think that for us, a reasonable time is a lot less than it is for the precursors. We don't have any idea of how their stuff works, nor for how long they needed it to last. You design and plan your equipment according to what you need. So if they needed transmitters, sun devices and such, that had to last a very long time, I think it's feasible that they would attempt to create selfsustaining apparatus of some sort.
And if you look further up in the thread, you'll see that we theorized on wether the Precursors would have a lot of installations for their scientific research on barren worlds where they might last a lot longer. I believe they would, seeing as the precursors are described as technologuically very advanced which you don't become unless you do at least a moderate bit of field studies. And they seem to have thought in long intervals. So their experiments would take a long time, and it would be handier if their facilities didn't need to get patched up all too often. We have found one or two projects abandoned, but there ought to be many more, I think.
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What's up doc?
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Flewellyn
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Now, here's a couple thoughts I've had about this question, and some related ones.
What makes us all so sure that "the Precursors" were one race? They could have been several, which existed at about the same time, and which may or may not have all gotten along. "Precursor" only means "those who came before us", so it could equally apply to one race, a couple races, or even a rather large number. Consider that in 100,000 years from the time of SC2, many of those races would have died out, moved on, or become unrecognizeable...then the ancient Humans, Syreen, VUX, Spathi, etc., would be "Precursors" to the starfaring sentients of that era. (The Chmmr, I imagine, would still be around. Those guys seem "built" to last.)
Even if all of the technologies that are "Precursor" origin are from one race, who is to say that there were not some others in the distant past, who fought against the Precursors? You might have noticed that their ships, while useful in a general, workhorse capacity, are loaded for bear...and that's just what we saw with the Vindicator, a Precursor tug! The Sa-Matra is an example of how extreme the firepower on Precursor ships could get...so why would they NEED it, if they were the only highly advanced race around?
And, finally, who's to say that quite a LOT of Precursor tech isn't still around, and that present-day sentients can't recognize it for what it is? The Taalo shield was hard to figure out; Chenjesu technology was pretty weird, and humans would have a hard time puzzling it out if the Chenjesu (and now Chmmr) weren't around to help. Who is to say that a lot of the Precursor technology that's been discovered, and used, is not the more primitive Precursor technology? If a primitive society found Earth, and found an old, actually working UNIVAC 1180 computer (mid-1960's mainframe machine), they might think it was incredibly sophisticated...never knowing about Sun Blade systems. (A hackneyed analogy, but I think you get the point.)
Given the above, there might be a number of possibilities besides the ones already mentioned in this thread:
1) The Precursors were several races, some of whom warred upon the others. A lot of their technology was destroyed, along with populations, cities, bases, planets, stars, etc. What's left over is the remnants of several mighty cultures. This would explain why, for example, the technology found on the Vindicator is pretty "standard" mechanical and electrical tech, while the Mycon (apparently a "Precursor" creation) are bioengineered, and have a completely different "feel" to them.
2) There were several other powerful races that were contemporaries of the Precursors, who we haven't discovered yet. The above war and such happened, after which the Precursors left, and most of their technology that wasn't taken with was destroyed by their enemies or captured.
3) The Precursors left a lot of things around that we haven't yet figured out are actually devices, and not other things: stuff that looks like moons, asteroids, organisms, planets, perhaps even a star-like object or two. We know about the Rainbow Worlds, so apparently this level of engineering wasn't beyond them. (What the Rainbow Worlds are for is still a mystery, The Unfortunate Third One notwithstanding.) Humans, Yehat, Chenjesu, et al, have blundered into, and even colonized, several Precursor artifacts without even realizing it.
4) The Precursors are really ortogs.
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JonoPorter
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Don't mess with the US.
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well they must be cannibals because no advance race cannot eat BEEF.
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« Last Edit: February 27, 2003, 09:46:55 am by BioSlayer »
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JonoPorter
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Don't mess with the US.
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ErekLich, No you are weird because I don't misspell weird. you gonkiluna!
BTW gonkiluna is not a word
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« Last Edit: February 27, 2003, 09:46:27 am by BioSlayer »
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Cyclone Jack
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You seem to forget about the Rainbow Worlds. Perhaps those were the only worlds in which they inhabited. When they left, they used some sort of 'Precursor device' that basically nuked the planet (and everything on it) which in turn, created the Rainbow World. They ARE very rich in minerals as well. True, they also point towards the center of the galaxy, which may or may not been a sign for others to follow.
I do NOT consider SC3 a sequel, thus SC3 did NOT happen. Which means that I am still waiting for the true sequel (as is everybody else). Perhaps someday...perhaps.
Cyclone Jack
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Death 999
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We did. You did. Yes we can. No.
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Yeah, the really sophisticated installation is the one we're standing on...
a la HGttG
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Cyamarin
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Midimaze!!!
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Incidentally, I think the fact that the Precursors might be more than one race is supported by the fact that the Sa-Matra and the Precursor vessel you pilot are almost NOTHING alike.
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Culture20
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1) The Precursors were several races, some of whom warred upon the others. A lot of their technology was destroyed, along with populations, cities, bases, planets, stars, etc. What's left over is the remnants of several mighty cultures. This would explain why, for example, the technology found on the Vindicator is pretty "standard" mechanical and electrical tech, while the Mycon (apparently a "Precursor" creation) are bioengineered, and have a completely different "feel" to them.
Though we've never found a Precursor body, or even a picture of one
we can conjecture what they looked like by examining the scale and layout of their equipment
Such an analysis indicates that they were giants, say 5 to 8 meters tall and twice as wide.
I don't know if they looked more like a brontosaur or an elephant.
Anyway, about three thousand years after the Precursors made their dramatic appearance
they vanished, poof! As far as we can tell, it took less than a decade to happen. - Commander Hayes
your vessel shares some similarities in design to the ur-quan's battle platform -Chenjesu/Mmrnmhrm under the slave shield
Although the Human and Chenjesu xeno-ergonomoligists* never got a chance to study the Sa-Matra up close, the Chenjesu think that it was built by the same aliens that the Humans call Precursors. To further fuel the "one-race of Precursors" idea, the "Shaggy Giants" of the Slylandro flew a ship which looks metallic like the Mark I, but has organic shapes, like the Sa-Matra: The Mark II (assuming this was the giant round ship). The precursor designs might have changed over the 3000 years from Mechanical to "Organic feel" to Biological.
An extra thought of my own: What if the Precursors were one race, but of two scientific factions: mechanical and biological? The Mycon and possibly the Sa-Matra are the creations of the Bio faction, the Mark I clearly the Mech faction, and if the Mmrnmhrm are of Precursor origin, they could be creations of the Mech faction too.
*xeno-ergonomoligists: Made up word meaning a scientist that studies the ergonomics of alien devices.
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Censored
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Somewhere, between the sacred silence and sleep.
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I doubt that;
Of course the Precursor vessel and the Sa-Matra are completely different; couple of reasons:
1) as someone mentioned before they two have totally different purposes
2) as someone (else) mentioned before they might have been designed at different times
3) us hunams built it on Vela, we OBVIOUSLY built it upon our needs, and in a way we can pilot it! that means a few adjustments, perhaps even to exterior look.
Also, I believe the Precursors are one race, throughout the game there are hints for that, e.g. the Slylandro say "Shaggy Giants" which refers to the Precursors as if they're all alike (same race)
The rainbow worlds are:
(Slylandro) "The Shaggy Ones either discovered these planets or... this is garbled.. assembled them? We were told the planets were... again this is confusing... organized (?) in some pattern which in some way alluded to the Shaggy Ones' ultimate fate. "
(Thraddash) "We suspect that this is one of the so-called `Precursor Dumps' "
WOHA!! LISTEN CLOSELY..
I just read this while going over Slylandro speech..
They say the first saw the Shaggy Ones 41 Drahn ago, and last seen them 39 Drahns ago, that's when they disappeared. When asked how long is a Drahn, they say "four million rotations of our planet". Yea, that helps. But, they also say, "The Ur-Quan?! The long brownish guys from the Milieu with all the eyes and arms? They used to come visit us regularly about three Drahns ago."
The Kohr-Ah and Kzer-Za tell you they were in the Milieu for 3,000 years (supposed Earth years), and in the Path of Now and Forever for over 20,000 years, and under Dnyarri compulsion for a few thousands of years. Let's make it 30,000 years?
So, three Drahns are about 30,000 years. That means the Precursors vanished about 390,000 years ago, all this considering these are Earth years! That's a pretty LONG time for artifacts to disintegrate, civilizations to stand and fall and all kinds of things to happen..
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"You boldly enter our space! Approach this Dreadnought as though it were a recreation base and then play the dumb hominid?
Who do you take us for, Captain... Spathi!?"
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