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About the hivemind!

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Kaslak_CG:
Sorry, when i answered i didn't read correctly, you were meaning "the last one" on a tactical mission, and not in general terms.

If I understood correctly, the small groups on tac missions are NOT detatched from the hive mind. The hivemind connection range can span light years, according to the official storyline. So...

Tamanfodder:
Actually NOT! The aliens on earth are cut off from the collective intelligence. They rejoin it once theyr mission on earth is complete, so the alien squad on earth creates a "sub hivemind" to keep them mentally capable for the mission. That is why the lone alien on the PHALANX alien containment was rendered to a imbesil. It got a litle bit smarter with every alien added to the containment and once there were ten aliens they started to be close to human intelligence. Conclution: The sole survivor of the harvester crew should show less mental capabilities than a cat!

Kaslak_CG:

--- Quote from: Tamanfodder on December 16, 2010, 07:01:06 pm ---Actually NOT! The aliens on earth are cut off from the collective intelligence. They rejoin it once theyr mission on earth is complete, so the alien squad on earth creates a "sub hivemind" to keep them mentally capable for the mission. That is why the lone alien on the PHALANX alien containment was rendered to a imbesil. It got a litle bit smarter with every alien added to the containment and once there were ten aliens they started to be close to human intelligence. Conclution: The sole survivor of the harvester crew should show less mental capabilities than a cat!

--- End quote ---

I didn't explore the story development ingame, if this detail emerges then you may be right or not - devs should explein if the virus functioning enters in symbiosis with the original brain or if it leaves the host an empty puppet. It depends.
These are taken from the official storyline, so if in game emerges contraddiction it must be resolved:

"The viral mind cannot voluntarily divide itself for more than a few days, much like a sane human being wouldn't voluntarily lobotomise himself. After a few days the XVI organisms in the hosts' blood will begin to mutate and resist reassimilation into the original mind, growing their own new mind instead. If left alone, these could grow more powerful than the original whilst outside supervision, and would undoubtedly come into conflict with the original over the same resources. The original is well aware of this and has no intention to be anything but number one."

"- Roughly 700,000 years ago
The virus develops a powerful psionic projector device, an offshoot of the wormhole FTL technology, allowing itself to maintain its hive mind over colonies several lightyears away. Unfortunately, the hard limits on the projectors' range restricts the virus to merely ravaging several systems at a time."


Since i read the official storyline i arrived at my conclusions. But did you find somewhere in game where it says the attackers are detatched from the hive mind?

Tamanfodder:
Research report about "odd behaviour":

Commander,

We have spent the past few weeks investigating these strange occurrences in our Containment unit, and we believe we've formulated a theory that may begin to explain the aliens' newfound intelligence.

It seems that we were off in our preliminary appraisal of how the alien intellect works. We first believed them to be autonomously operating individuals, in the same way humans are, though with superior communications and team tactics. However, our lab experiments and an intense review of battlefield footage now seem to contradict that hypothesis.

In our video records, we have often seen the aliens seeking cover, coordinating their fire, working as a team even though they carry no obvious communications equipment. However, when we captured a few live specimens in our Containment unit, they never displayed anything above the level of animal instinct. This seems incongruous with the evidence we have; large, well-developed brain structures and a proven knowledge of combat tactics.

We sought to reconcile these ideas in a new hypothesis, and our experiments have begun to produce tangible results. The new specimens certainly are responsible for the strange behaviour we've observed, but we originally assumed that they were officers of some type under colour of authority. We now believe that theory to also be wrong. Our experiments prove that when the aliens are allowed to congregate, with or without the suspected 'officers', they become significantly more active and sophisticated. When they are separated from each other for a large enough distance, they revert back to their basic states. The conclusion is obvious. There is some kind of communal force binding these creatures together.

A string of new theories has emerged. The most likely explanation is in the alien brain. There are several species of alien, all of which meet the physiological requirements for a sentient species, but they show little to no brainwave activity of their own. This implies the presence of some kind of shared or distributed thought between them, a hive mind that grows more intelligent as it grows in numbers. We're not sure how it's possible for this hive mind to cross species boundaries; it's obvious that the different alien races originated on different worlds, with vastly divergent evolutionary paths, and some species appear to have been around far longer than others. However, given the aliens' advanced technology, the 'how' is less of an enigma than the 'why'.

These new findings also seem to suggest that specimens down on Earth are cut off from the source of their intelligence. While this may be an important advantage for PHALANX forces, it also brings up threats we had not yet considered. Our research into alien physiology has established that isolated specimens cannot survive very long in our environment, and behave with little enough intelligence while they're on the surface; but if a large enough number is allowed to escape and coordinate with each other -- or with alien sympathisers on Earth -- we could be looking at a serious infiltration risk.

With several specimens on hand, their intelligence now seems to be approaching the human level. If we can create a suitable translation device or common language, we believe we may finally be able to establish communications with aliens in PHALANX captivity. Perhaps some of our linguists or psychology experts could form a dialogue. This is an avenue of inquiry that we cannot afford to ignore.

Of course, if such experiments were to be approved by the Base Commander, I assure you that my team would take full precautions. Nothing is more important to us than the lives of our men and the security of our facilities.

Sincerely,

Dr. Connor

Kaslak_CG:
Thanks.

Now... seems there are two contraddiction to solve in game...

First of all the problems you were saying before, about last-alien behaviour in tac missions.
The second contraddiction is about the grand campaign - storyline, which i have pointed.

So let's say there is a sub-hivemind controlling Earth operation... maybe only captured aliens are cut-off to avoid information spreading? While the ones on tac missions are still connected to the Earth ops. subhive?

The other possibility is as pointed by Hertzilla. The subhive connects only the aliens in the tac mission, and could have very low morale so when they take penalities the last ones start panicking. (thus simulating low intelligence, cowering).

This one still contraddicts the idea of huge connection distance of hivemind... it's a design problem. Devs, what now?

The ony thing that fixes both contraddictions is to take the aliens not detatched, and the hivemind has the capability to cut off aliens captured from humans. Given the possibility of long-range psionic control and the possibility of revolt from the sub-hivemind it would be a strategical mistake to create the sub-hivemind...

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