this post was submitted on 24 Jul 2025
45 points (100.0% liked)
chapotraphouse
13954 readers
522 users here now
Banned? DM Wmill to appeal.
No anti-nautilism posts. See: Eco-fascism Primer
Slop posts go in c/slop. Don't post low-hanging fruit here.
founded 4 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Eh, if someone is unaware of the scale of the Combine in lore it's not hard to think the two forces are roughly equal. Earth is a crappy backwater to the Combine and you never really run into anything but the dregs of their forces during the games. Even the slug dudes you meet in the later games are the ones too inept to get a better posting on a planet that doesn't have a poisonous atmosphere.
Idk I could see them being relatively equivalent in terms of territorial scale, like sure the combine is trans dimensional and could be theoretically infinite, but who knows how many worlds they actually control in each dimension they're present in? Probably not a number approaching infinity, especially since Earth is such a "backwater" but still important enough for them to want to invade (which i feel like they wouldn't do if there are an abundance of other worlds, especially ones their ruling class can breathe on unaided).
Like idk i could see them having a # of planets roughly equal to the hundreds or thousands of habitable worlds controlled by earth on hell divers
I still think the combine would win though just because imo they're clearly more technologically advanced, they can make portals, they can control reality warping entities like the GMan, etc. Like I'm sure if they wanted to they could just teleport a star into the center of the earth or some shit
Their interest in Earth seems to stem from how Earth's sciensts created teleportation within the same universe, which is something the combine was never able to nail despite their resources. That meant humans were a bit of a liability, but they didn't seem to think it would take much to control and manage the population. Or who even knows, the combine might even have a hard time making plans since they're so widespread and may not see time the same way as humans.