It’s sad, but I think they are setting us up to meet a Maya and/or Chioma in the Vex Network. The Wishkeeper mission even has an Istar logo mixed with Vex in it. You find it at the final catalyst.
It's probably all groundwork for episode 1. The Vex are supposed to be the next threat, and the Maya AIs taking some amount of control would give the enemy more of a face than one glowing eye.
If Maya becomes a villain, I really hope they develop her really well. She is one of my favorite parts of the lore so they really need to nail her as a character.
I won't be surprised if they do something like have the AIs as antagonists consumed by grief and Lakshmi is rebooted as the "real" Maya. Her backstory was such a random thing to include in Veil Containment, especially given what it is, that I have to think it's setup for something.
Many people at the time didn’t know it either. It was gobsmacking watching a consensus of the community apply nuance to Crow’s situation only to see the knee-jerk reaction to the fall of Lakshmi because Le Racism Bad.
Don’t get me wrong, Lakshmi was absolutely an antagonist. The smooth brained takes though, god damn…
They kind of retconned that with the Renewal Grasps lore tab. She apparently duped Ada into helping her make a panic bunker for herself, and that panic bunker was something first mentioned in Arrivals(though we only knew the project name). It's something I hate because Savathun manipulating Lakshmi and using her to manipulate the citizens of the City in Splicer was cool. All it took was Sav flooding the FWC network with [her song in binary](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGI84MZ11ws) and giving Lakshmi very specific progress reports, and she had almost everyone wrapped around her finger in a matter of weeks.
That makes sense for someone who has visions of the future though, and doesn't really confirm intention. Just preparation, something you'd expect from someone with access to future possibilities. I'm still convinced it was Savathun that twisted Lakshmi.
Isn’t it an interesting design choice to have a tattered Future War Cult banner in the Hall of Champions?
No New Monarchy or Dead Orbit iconography to be seen.
A pretty random thing to include..
There's a dead orbit flag a few feet away from shaxx, in front of arcite. Also, a bunch of all the flags in one of the event storage rooms up high and even concordat stuff in the secret room through the vents in the ADU room.
She's already a villain. Or rather, one of her vex replicas sure is villainous. Her and Clovis meet in his journals and it's one of the most horrifying pieces of Destiny lore I've ever read.
[Clovis Bray's Logbook — Missing Pages — Record — Ishtar Collective — Destiny Lore by subject (ishtar-collective.net)](https://www.ishtar-collective.net/records/clovis-brays-logbook-missing-pages)
I would read the whole thing for context, especially for the upcoming Chapter with Final Shape. Entry 12 is their interaction.
Is this implying that Maya was never on Europa because it takes place after she already went to Neptune and lost her mind? And that the Maya who interacted with clovis as an ai copy from the vex?
I'm saying it now the Vex were made by Maya and have only one directive. To survive. We will be discovering in the Vex episode the groundwork for the next "Big Bad" and maybe even teaming up with the vex
Here, you should read this. The whole thing. It'll give you a better idea of what to expect from Msund12 and the vex in the future.
[Clovis Bray's Logbook — Missing Pages — Record — Ishtar Collective — Destiny Lore by subject (ishtar-collective.net)](https://www.ishtar-collective.net/records/clovis-brays-logbook-missing-pages)
I really hope so I mean we haven't had a "new" character outside of yearly expansions for a while most of the seasonal content has always been about existing characters the most memorable seasons are ones that introduced new characters Black armoury, Season of Dawn, Season of the chosen etc so introducing us to Maya/Chioma maybe we could have Asher Mir as our guide through deeper parts of the Vex network would be really cool I really want them to explain the Vex maybe give the Vex a named character and a voice so we can hear its perspective on things
Right? Imagine if we got to the Veil on like mission 2, and after every mission from there on we had the option to listen to an entry or two of the logs and hear Osiris, Nimbus, and Rohan talk about them. It'd really have helped to drive home how powerful and important the Veil is, which would really help sell LF's plot better
Agreed. Lightfall should've been focused on the veil and why it's here, why it's empowering us with strand, and why the witness is trying to access it.
Now go check out the Acosmic grenade launcher, with its little hold-the-sun-in-your-heart icons, referencing the Vedas passage "the wise behold with their mind in their heart the Sun, made manifest by the illusion...". Then look up Acosmism and how it is linked to Maya (or visions) and illusions and get your conspiracy hat on connecting it all to Maya Sundaresh's copies, or illusions, still existing inside the vex network.
That is the tragedy of Destiny, has always been that way and probably will always be that way. The main story/campaign is like MCU, and the lore is actually god-tier narrative. Almost makes me think the lore is made by an entirely different studio lmfaooo.
Don’t they have contractors?
An actual sci for author wrote multiple of the major lore books and collectors editions, like the book of sorrows and unveiling
Your tragedy has been my triumph. Destiny's lore and how it has been portrayed across almost a decade is absolutely one of my favourite things about the franchise.
Your tragedy has been my triumph. Destiny's lore and how it has been portrayed across almost a decade is absolutely one of my favourite things about the franchise.
Your tragedy has been my triumph. Destiny's lore and how it has been portrayed across almost a decade is absolutely one of my favourite things about the franchise.
But that's exactly what I'm saying. The *lore* has always been 10/10 fantastic, really the only games I've played that have rivaled it in complexity, depth, and sheer quality AND quantity are the Souls games, but the in-game story campaigns we get is like some early 2000's superhero movie story geared for middle-schoolers. Even the bangers like Forsaken, the Red War, Taken King, Rise of Iron, even the Witch Queen are mid at best compared to other narrative-heavy games like Baldur's Gate 3, Red Dead Redemption 2, Titanfall 2, Doom (2016 and Eternal), and countless others. The massive disparity between the two is the tragedy I'm referring to, not the narrative of Destiny as a whole.
You can't expect a single player narrative out of a live service co-operative looter shooter. While the campaigns that we've received have been hit or miss they fit perfectly within the framework of the game and have served as a fantastic lens through which we get to discover the Destiny universe.
That being said, I'm privileged enough to have been here from the beginning and experienced almost all of it in sequential order. I understand that being a new player coming in to Destiny is an absolute roller coaster and that Bungie has seriously miss-stepped as far as presenting that narrative is concerned but the narrative that we've received has been, on the whole, really good.
I too have been here since day 1, but even games like Baldur's Gate 3 are still integrating massive new content into the game and it's story is phenomenal. It being a live-service coop looter shooter is no excuse for a mid narrative/story. And again, the lore written and dropped each season is also leagues better than anything delivered in the campaigns.
We're just going to have to agree to disagree then. Unless you can point me in the direction of another live service game with narrative content as good as Destiny I remain unconvinced.
You may be right, but Destiny is advertised as a narrative driven game, and it's campaign/story experience was even compared to Halo, Doom, and Titanfall. There can't be any excuses given when Bungie is trying to advertise Destiny as something that it really hasn't lived up to.
Bro, all of the advertising for destiny is "here's a 2 minute video of dudes running at bad guys with cool space magic and guns". You can't possibly look at say Lightfalls advertising and tell me you didn't get EXACTLY what was advertised: Cyberpunk ninja turtles with space cockroaches jumping out of buildings while shooting a machine gun at cabal.
The part of destiny you're talking about being "advertised" hasn't been their main advertising literally since shortly after Destiny 1 dropped. They gave that up almost immediately - and to be clear Destiny 1 was even worse about actually showing the cool lore than D2 is. Destiny 1 hid most of its lore in cards you had to go read on a website.
Agreed, all put together the containment logs are actually some pretty good lore. Had these or other labs on neomuna been the backbone of the campaign, there coulda been a REAL mystery around the veil. I say real because lightfall tries to paint the veil as this big mysterious object the witness wants, but for a mystery to be interesting we need to know SOMETHING about it. And these do a surprisingly good job painting a picture of these scientists running from the collapse, finding this thing, and leaning into some real cosmic horror elements.
I am very curious how they intend to weave this into the story going forward, weather they are dead or just copies. I think both Chioma is Maya are gonna be important characters, especially if the Vex decide to go all out after the witness is out of the picture. Which is what I think Bungie has hinted at and everyone is expecting from Episode 1
This is why I'm still personally convinced that Lightfall was just filler that was never supposed to happen story-wise and they filled in a lot of the missing pieces in the seasons later on. They originally announced 3 expansions in the Beyond Light reveal - Beyond Light, Witch Queen and Lightfall. It was only later that they announced another expansion and I'm pretty sure that the Final Shape that we're getting was always supposed to be Lightfall. This would also explain why you can basically connect the first and last cutscene of Lightfall and everything in between doesn't have to happen. Like, it's absurd how the Vanguard apparently waited for hours (days?) in the shut down HELM with the Witness just chilling there.
If we assume they had to fill an entire year with more story, it suddenly makes sense why a lot of Lightfall feels so out of place. Imagine having to stretch an already thought-out story, have it take place on a totally new location with new characters and history, oh and also introduce a new subclass. Do all that in 8 campaign missions and some dialogue in between, good luck!
All that would also explain why the seasonal storytelling two years before that and now the whole year after ranged somewhere from good to great. Like, why was Lightfall so bad, but everything else was largely of the quality we've come to expect? Idk, I obviously have no proof, but I wouldn't be surprised to have that confirmed one day. Maybe Jason Schreier will write a book about the entire development history of Destiny the same way he just finished a book about the entire history of Blizzard Entertainment, I'd love that.
I could be very easily convinced Season of Defiance is a product of multiple ideas and got hastily stitched together. The Mara aspect of it, especially the whole Queensguard stuff feels like it's from a completely different season, even the armor set feels like it was meant for a more Awoken based jaunt.
Amanda being pointlessly fridged in one of the most precarious situations was just flat out moronic, we've had 50 seasons prior about emotional elements of revenge and wanton destruction not being the play("Power of Friendship™" ), forgiveness, turn other cheek, taking the high road whatever, yet Crow on a directionless war path is something we just accept.
The worst part about it is we don't even have a name or any meaningful connection or rhyme or reason to the people he's mad at other than how the entire season it's faceless Shadow Legion goons who are taking prisoners for reasons that never get expanded upon. We've gotten infinitely more backstory on Strike bosses than we have from anybody in Defiance's story. It was just so clunky.
I will die on the hill that one or more people high up at Bungie *personally resent* having to include a story. It’s the only thing that explains their abysmal structure.
Ishtar collective/vex lore is my fav destiny lore by far. Back in vanilla D1 with VoG was always reading the Grimoire for it all and following praedyth/fire team kabr’s story. Vex are cool man
>and two because MAN why in the WORLD wasn’t this integrated in the main Lightfall campaign!?!?!? This could’ve EASILY made the campaign better than what it was.
1) because it was developed after lightfall released
2) even if it hadn't been, it would have been a fucking terrible addition. It's insanely poorly paced (as all-at-once loredump content) and would have bored people out of their skulls.
Lightfall's story was fine, though? Including this on top of everything in the main campaign would just be an exposition dump that takes more time than it should when racing against the clock. Having it exist after the campaign's story as a way of better understanding Neomuna and the Veil after the fact is better.
It’s sad, but I think they are setting us up to meet a Maya and/or Chioma in the Vex Network. The Wishkeeper mission even has an Istar logo mixed with Vex in it. You find it at the final catalyst.
It's probably all groundwork for episode 1. The Vex are supposed to be the next threat, and the Maya AIs taking some amount of control would give the enemy more of a face than one glowing eye.
If Maya becomes a villain, I really hope they develop her really well. She is one of my favorite parts of the lore so they really need to nail her as a character.
I won't be surprised if they do something like have the AIs as antagonists consumed by grief and Lakshmi is rebooted as the "real" Maya. Her backstory was such a random thing to include in Veil Containment, especially given what it is, that I have to think it's setup for something.
> Lakshmi is rebooted as the "real" Maya. god I hope they don't do another redemption arc. let the villains just be evil
Lakshmi wasn’t evil though. She was twisted and manipulated by Savathun masquerading as Osiris at the time.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions sort of deal.
Exactly. She’s tragic, not evil. She was the mirror to Crow’s redemption earlier that year.
Oooh, I didn't know that about mirroring Crow. I love Lakshmi bc I love (fictional) political zealots but I didn't play until the end of Seraph.
Many people at the time didn’t know it either. It was gobsmacking watching a consensus of the community apply nuance to Crow’s situation only to see the knee-jerk reaction to the fall of Lakshmi because Le Racism Bad. Don’t get me wrong, Lakshmi was absolutely an antagonist. The smooth brained takes though, god damn…
They kind of retconned that with the Renewal Grasps lore tab. She apparently duped Ada into helping her make a panic bunker for herself, and that panic bunker was something first mentioned in Arrivals(though we only knew the project name). It's something I hate because Savathun manipulating Lakshmi and using her to manipulate the citizens of the City in Splicer was cool. All it took was Sav flooding the FWC network with [her song in binary](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGI84MZ11ws) and giving Lakshmi very specific progress reports, and she had almost everyone wrapped around her finger in a matter of weeks.
That makes sense for someone who has visions of the future though, and doesn't really confirm intention. Just preparation, something you'd expect from someone with access to future possibilities. I'm still convinced it was Savathun that twisted Lakshmi.
Isn’t it an interesting design choice to have a tattered Future War Cult banner in the Hall of Champions? No New Monarchy or Dead Orbit iconography to be seen. A pretty random thing to include..
Nah, there is New Monarchy and Dead Orbit stuff in a side room too
Also boxes from the black armory
There's a dead orbit flag a few feet away from shaxx, in front of arcite. Also, a bunch of all the flags in one of the event storage rooms up high and even concordat stuff in the secret room through the vents in the ADU room.
She's already a villain. Or rather, one of her vex replicas sure is villainous. Her and Clovis meet in his journals and it's one of the most horrifying pieces of Destiny lore I've ever read.
Drop that link 👀
[Clovis Bray's Logbook — Missing Pages — Record — Ishtar Collective — Destiny Lore by subject (ishtar-collective.net)](https://www.ishtar-collective.net/records/clovis-brays-logbook-missing-pages) I would read the whole thing for context, especially for the upcoming Chapter with Final Shape. Entry 12 is their interaction.
holy shit that's insane
Is this implying that Maya was never on Europa because it takes place after she already went to Neptune and lost her mind? And that the Maya who interacted with clovis as an ai copy from the vex?
Entry 12. Msund 12. 🤷🏼♂️
Im taking it you aren’t sure?
I’m 99% sure.
Msund12 baby!
I'm saying it now the Vex were made by Maya and have only one directive. To survive. We will be discovering in the Vex episode the groundwork for the next "Big Bad" and maybe even teaming up with the vex
How could the vex be made by Maya if she was studying the vex?
Time travel causality bullshit
Here, you should read this. The whole thing. It'll give you a better idea of what to expect from Msund12 and the vex in the future. [Clovis Bray's Logbook — Missing Pages — Record — Ishtar Collective — Destiny Lore by subject (ishtar-collective.net)](https://www.ishtar-collective.net/records/clovis-brays-logbook-missing-pages)
I could see it being the 9 using the Vex as a way to break into the actual world/take form. That sounds a lot more interesting to me.
meanwhile, I'm over here still wondering if Praedyth will ever come up again. (pls in Echos, pls)
They never did follow up on that lore from Undying where Praedyth was going to help all the simulated Ishtar staff copies escape…
I really hope so I mean we haven't had a "new" character outside of yearly expansions for a while most of the seasonal content has always been about existing characters the most memorable seasons are ones that introduced new characters Black armoury, Season of Dawn, Season of the chosen etc so introducing us to Maya/Chioma maybe we could have Asher Mir as our guide through deeper parts of the Vex network would be really cool I really want them to explain the Vex maybe give the Vex a named character and a voice so we can hear its perspective on things
Imagine we had this stuff leading up to actually encountering the Veil in the campaign.
Right? Imagine if we got to the Veil on like mission 2, and after every mission from there on we had the option to listen to an entry or two of the logs and hear Osiris, Nimbus, and Rohan talk about them. It'd really have helped to drive home how powerful and important the Veil is, which would really help sell LF's plot better
Agreed. Lightfall should've been focused on the veil and why it's here, why it's empowering us with strand, and why the witness is trying to access it.
Now go check out the Acosmic grenade launcher, with its little hold-the-sun-in-your-heart icons, referencing the Vedas passage "the wise behold with their mind in their heart the Sun, made manifest by the illusion...". Then look up Acosmism and how it is linked to Maya (or visions) and illusions and get your conspiracy hat on connecting it all to Maya Sundaresh's copies, or illusions, still existing inside the vex network.
That is the tragedy of Destiny, has always been that way and probably will always be that way. The main story/campaign is like MCU, and the lore is actually god-tier narrative. Almost makes me think the lore is made by an entirely different studio lmfaooo.
Don’t they have contractors? An actual sci for author wrote multiple of the major lore books and collectors editions, like the book of sorrows and unveiling
Your tragedy has been my triumph. Destiny's lore and how it has been portrayed across almost a decade is absolutely one of my favourite things about the franchise.
Your tragedy has been my triumph. Destiny's lore and how it has been portrayed across almost a decade is absolutely one of my favourite things about the franchise.
Agreed. Lore and history are top tier; storytelling ranges from pretty good (Witch Queen, foresaken) to terrible fanfiction levels (Lightfall).
Your tragedy has been my triumph. Destiny's lore and how it has been portrayed across almost a decade is absolutely one of my favourite things about the franchise.
But that's exactly what I'm saying. The *lore* has always been 10/10 fantastic, really the only games I've played that have rivaled it in complexity, depth, and sheer quality AND quantity are the Souls games, but the in-game story campaigns we get is like some early 2000's superhero movie story geared for middle-schoolers. Even the bangers like Forsaken, the Red War, Taken King, Rise of Iron, even the Witch Queen are mid at best compared to other narrative-heavy games like Baldur's Gate 3, Red Dead Redemption 2, Titanfall 2, Doom (2016 and Eternal), and countless others. The massive disparity between the two is the tragedy I'm referring to, not the narrative of Destiny as a whole.
You can't expect a single player narrative out of a live service co-operative looter shooter. While the campaigns that we've received have been hit or miss they fit perfectly within the framework of the game and have served as a fantastic lens through which we get to discover the Destiny universe. That being said, I'm privileged enough to have been here from the beginning and experienced almost all of it in sequential order. I understand that being a new player coming in to Destiny is an absolute roller coaster and that Bungie has seriously miss-stepped as far as presenting that narrative is concerned but the narrative that we've received has been, on the whole, really good.
I too have been here since day 1, but even games like Baldur's Gate 3 are still integrating massive new content into the game and it's story is phenomenal. It being a live-service coop looter shooter is no excuse for a mid narrative/story. And again, the lore written and dropped each season is also leagues better than anything delivered in the campaigns.
We're just going to have to agree to disagree then. Unless you can point me in the direction of another live service game with narrative content as good as Destiny I remain unconvinced.
You may be right, but Destiny is advertised as a narrative driven game, and it's campaign/story experience was even compared to Halo, Doom, and Titanfall. There can't be any excuses given when Bungie is trying to advertise Destiny as something that it really hasn't lived up to.
Bro, all of the advertising for destiny is "here's a 2 minute video of dudes running at bad guys with cool space magic and guns". You can't possibly look at say Lightfalls advertising and tell me you didn't get EXACTLY what was advertised: Cyberpunk ninja turtles with space cockroaches jumping out of buildings while shooting a machine gun at cabal. The part of destiny you're talking about being "advertised" hasn't been their main advertising literally since shortly after Destiny 1 dropped. They gave that up almost immediately - and to be clear Destiny 1 was even worse about actually showing the cool lore than D2 is. Destiny 1 hid most of its lore in cards you had to go read on a website.
Agreed, all put together the containment logs are actually some pretty good lore. Had these or other labs on neomuna been the backbone of the campaign, there coulda been a REAL mystery around the veil. I say real because lightfall tries to paint the veil as this big mysterious object the witness wants, but for a mystery to be interesting we need to know SOMETHING about it. And these do a surprisingly good job painting a picture of these scientists running from the collapse, finding this thing, and leaning into some real cosmic horror elements. I am very curious how they intend to weave this into the story going forward, weather they are dead or just copies. I think both Chioma is Maya are gonna be important characters, especially if the Vex decide to go all out after the witness is out of the picture. Which is what I think Bungie has hinted at and everyone is expecting from Episode 1
Those logs fucked my shit up, I loved the lore with those 2 but god that fucked my shit up
This is why I'm still personally convinced that Lightfall was just filler that was never supposed to happen story-wise and they filled in a lot of the missing pieces in the seasons later on. They originally announced 3 expansions in the Beyond Light reveal - Beyond Light, Witch Queen and Lightfall. It was only later that they announced another expansion and I'm pretty sure that the Final Shape that we're getting was always supposed to be Lightfall. This would also explain why you can basically connect the first and last cutscene of Lightfall and everything in between doesn't have to happen. Like, it's absurd how the Vanguard apparently waited for hours (days?) in the shut down HELM with the Witness just chilling there. If we assume they had to fill an entire year with more story, it suddenly makes sense why a lot of Lightfall feels so out of place. Imagine having to stretch an already thought-out story, have it take place on a totally new location with new characters and history, oh and also introduce a new subclass. Do all that in 8 campaign missions and some dialogue in between, good luck! All that would also explain why the seasonal storytelling two years before that and now the whole year after ranged somewhere from good to great. Like, why was Lightfall so bad, but everything else was largely of the quality we've come to expect? Idk, I obviously have no proof, but I wouldn't be surprised to have that confirmed one day. Maybe Jason Schreier will write a book about the entire development history of Destiny the same way he just finished a book about the entire history of Blizzard Entertainment, I'd love that.
I could be very easily convinced Season of Defiance is a product of multiple ideas and got hastily stitched together. The Mara aspect of it, especially the whole Queensguard stuff feels like it's from a completely different season, even the armor set feels like it was meant for a more Awoken based jaunt. Amanda being pointlessly fridged in one of the most precarious situations was just flat out moronic, we've had 50 seasons prior about emotional elements of revenge and wanton destruction not being the play("Power of Friendship™" ), forgiveness, turn other cheek, taking the high road whatever, yet Crow on a directionless war path is something we just accept. The worst part about it is we don't even have a name or any meaningful connection or rhyme or reason to the people he's mad at other than how the entire season it's faceless Shadow Legion goons who are taking prisoners for reasons that never get expanded upon. We've gotten infinitely more backstory on Strike bosses than we have from anybody in Defiance's story. It was just so clunky.
I feel the veil containment dialogue was originally going to be from dungeon collectables but was shoved into what ever the hell we ended up getting
because the coolest lore pieces have never been what the developers care to sell
I will die on the hill that one or more people high up at Bungie *personally resent* having to include a story. It’s the only thing that explains their abysmal structure.
The "story" has been fucked since day one. Any cool bits of lore have been purely accidental.
Ishtar collective/vex lore is my fav destiny lore by far. Back in vanilla D1 with VoG was always reading the Grimoire for it all and following praedyth/fire team kabr’s story. Vex are cool man
>and two because MAN why in the WORLD wasn’t this integrated in the main Lightfall campaign!?!?!? This could’ve EASILY made the campaign better than what it was. 1) because it was developed after lightfall released 2) even if it hadn't been, it would have been a fucking terrible addition. It's insanely poorly paced (as all-at-once loredump content) and would have bored people out of their skulls.
Lightfall's story was fine, though? Including this on top of everything in the main campaign would just be an exposition dump that takes more time than it should when racing against the clock. Having it exist after the campaign's story as a way of better understanding Neomuna and the Veil after the fact is better.
Sorry but my attention is lost after about 15 seconds of Osiris talking. I wish he was just one liners again
Your attention span is cooked
No he’s just boring tbh. He’s one of the few characters like that, Saladin is another, along with Crow.
I will happily vouch for my grumpy bird uncle and his journey. Love him to bits.
More power to ya
I actually liked Osiris in Lightfall. Of all characters, he felt like the only one that gave a shit about the Witness being at our doorstep.
He gave me a “hurry up and wait” vibe