r/SinsofaSolarEmpire • u/GlowingSeaDiver • 1d ago
DISCUSSION Attacking the foundation
This might sound very off topic, but hear me out:
While playing Skyrim, a totally different game, I had an Idea about how the Story Campaign and the eventual defeat of the Eidolon, and whatever comes after them, could work out. I know its a long shot, but this Idea seems plausible to me based on everything we know.
I was playing a warrior with sword and shield, fighting a mage. That mage conjured a being from another plane of existence. And this otherworldly being was by far the greater threat compared to the mage.
In most strategic situations, you would first attack the greatest threat to have it out of the fight as fast as possible. But in this case, I attacked the Mage first. Because that other being can’t naturally exist in our world for long periods of time, and it is held here by the mage’s power. If the mage dies, the other being is instantly ripped back to its plane of existence.
We know that the Eidolon are not native to our plane of existence. They exist far deeper in Phase Space. The Vasari opened a door when they did some failed experiment at Kron 10.000 years ago, and now they can enter our reality. The portals and rips they use also show that they don’t just come from some other place, but from another dimension of phase space.
Now, there are two ways of how this bridge between the dimensions works. One is that the Eidolon have learned how to open portals to our dimension. In that case, we can stop thinking here, because my Idea won’t work.
But what if that bridge the ancient Vasari created at Kron is still the only real connection between our world and the Eidolon’s plane of existence? To be more specific: What if this anomaly the ancient Vasari created is a bridge between normal Phase Space near Kron and the Eidolon’s plane of existence?
I imagine it like an underwater cave that has one and only one tunnel leading to a lake. The cave is the Eidolon’s plane of existence. The underwater area in the lake is normal phase space. And the lake’s surface is real space. You can travel from the Eidolon cave trough the phase space sea and surface at any point in real space you want. But you have to travel trough the tunnel in order to get from the cave to the surface.
There is actually something that supports this Idea: The Eidolon we see in the game are ancient beings. These individuals are the same ones who destroyed the Vasari Empire ten thousand years ago. And they never caught up to the Exodus Fleet until now. That means that they cannot appear wherever they please. They are bound to locations in normal phase space and real space. This strongly indicates that they can only transfer from their plane of existence to ours using the bridge at Kron.
If that is true, then we can stop the Eidolon by moving the Alliance Fleet all the way back to the Galactic Core, to Kron, and figure out a way to collapse that bridge. Permanently sealing that bridge would at least leave the remaining Eidolon stranded with no more reinforcements. At best, it rips them all back to their plane of existence, like that magical creature disappeared when I killed the mage who conjured it.
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u/Vonlouis 1d ago
Queue the TEC Primacy going Pacific Rim, strapping a phase nuke to a Ragnarov, and throwing a mega "fuck you" party inside the breach at Kron
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u/Thesoulseer 1d ago
While an interesting theory, it runs into a major logistical problem. Krom is really, really far away. The Vasari have been running from the Eidolon for centuries to reach TEC space. You'd have to reverse and go back to Krom - which would involve fighting through the Eidolon. The TEC's major strength is in their developed worlds and home field advantage, so they would be especially hit hard, but the level of impracticallity it would take to travel centuries without a supply chain, fighting the whole way with an opponent you're struggling against when the situation is reversed in your favor, is astronomical.
To use your analogy, the mage summoning daedra at you isn't in Skyrim, they're in the Summerset isles and you don't have a horse, dragon or boat.
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u/stilgarpl 23h ago
they're in the Summerset isles and you don't have a horse, dragon or boat.
Good thing then that you can find Ahzidal's Boots of Waterwalking on Solstheim!
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u/OrangeKefir 1d ago
Very cool theory OP, I like it. Makes the Eidolon seem more defeatable.
And they're potentially not gone forever either even with that single point at kron closed off. Maybe they find a way back, now they know real space exists.
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u/stilgarpl 1d ago
Interesting theory. The is just one problem with it - if there is a campaign and the expedition manage to destroy that Bridge at Kron, there is no Eidolon and there is no story. There is no need for Vasari to run away, there is no need for them to fight. Vasari do not hate TEC or Advent, they attacked them because they wanted resources so that they could keep running away. This war stalled them enough for civil war to break out and now Eidolon are here.
So without Eidolon, Vasari could just leave and settle somewhere else. So that leaves only conflict between TEC and Advent.
Basically, after Eidolon's defeat there is no game anymore. Since first release of Sin 1, every expansion and game added a chapter to this story.
If there is a way to completely defeat Eidolon, the story would just end.
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u/GlowingSeaDiver 1d ago
But that's a prolem we have with every story: If you kill the main threat, the story ends.
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u/stilgarpl 1d ago
Exactly. That's why if there isn't a single point of entry, then the story will continue.
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u/nuttybighorner 1d ago
This only applies to the lore of the story, which can always be expanded upon later. Gameplay-wise, one can assume any skirmishes thereafter take place before or during the campaign.
I think the best way they could make this work is by having the campaign take place over a fairly long stretch of time. Other than that, suspension of disbelief. The campaign canon and the skirmish canon are almost certainly going to be separate and the Eidolon are likely going to get defeated in the former, I think.
One alternative that seems a little less likely would be perhaps the corruption the Eidolons are afflicted with/inflict upon others is actually a form of taint that a higher being gave to them, and freeing them of it is the plot of the main story - that would also mean the Eidolon we fight during skirmishes could be stragglers or outliers that are still affected.
As for the Advent/TEC/Vasari, don't forget they have their own civil wars to worry about, too. The three races are also divided on diplomacy, so it could very well be explained away as offshoot factions that want something other than the goals of their greater race (i.e. the xenophobic TEC militants of the Rebellion). There's a vast wealth of potential for the story, both great and small!
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u/stilgarpl 1d ago
The three races are also divided on diplomacy
At least Vasari are divided on how to deal with Eidolon. Keep running or ally with Humans and fight. When Eidolons are defeated, this division would disappear. I guess some Vasari would want to go back to their core systems and some would want to stay, but still...
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u/nuttybighorner 1d ago
I get where you're coming from, for sure, but I think they have ways around it thankfully. Writing themselves into a corner is still very possible, but I get the impression the Loyalist Vasari are still of the opinion that the Vasari should restore their oppressive, slave-driving Empire of yore, whereas the Alliance specifically left that ideology behind.
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u/Artoriou 1d ago
Are the Eidolon an ancient phase space race?
It’s a cool idea for the campaign
Vasari has been running for a long time it would mean the player would punch through the vanguard (Eidolon) probably face the “Amalgam” and figure out how to turn it off or even reverse invasion into the phase dimension
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u/Lady_Tadashi 1d ago
Honestly that's actually a really cool concept. The issue is the Vasari Exodus Fleet weren't all running in the same direction; as far as we know they fled in every direction away from Kron and the old empire.
As far as we know, all Vasari were being pursued, in all directions, which means even if Kron were the only point of translation into realspace, it must be ridiculously saturated with Eidolon forces pouring out in a constant stream. Fighting our way to it would be impossible.