Line #20 Headscratchers/GearsOfWar


1	* Okay, is Sera a colony world of Earth, or are its inhabitants HumanAliens? The games never actually address this, and there hasn't been a reliable-sounding citation of WordOfGod on the issue either.
2	** It has been left deliberately vague.
3	*** The most commonly heard theory, and generally the most widely accepted, is that Sera is just an AlternateUniverse Earth.
4	*** Another theory is that when you reverse the name Sera, you get Ares. Ares was renamed Mars by the Romans. Sera is fast becoming a desert world. Sera is Mars, We are The Human Aliens.
5	*** It seems like everyone is expecting the Gears of War universe to tie in with Earth somewhere. But...does it have to be? Why can't it just be a regular ol' planet in a regular ol', non Earth related universe the creators just made up to tell their story? Maybe Earth and our universe was entirely nonexistent in Gears of War; that it's just its own standalone universe. Maybe the 'This planet is REALLY A LONG LOST COLONY WORLD OF EARTH' reveal has been used so much in fiction, that everyone is just sorta standing around for it.
6	*** Well, the idea of a planet that's similar to but distinct from Earth is rather uncommon in sci-fi. It's more common in HighFantasy, but hardly ever used for sci-fi, almost every sci-fi work ties to the real Earth in some way.
7	** In the vein of this, if it is "just" a colony world, why do they keep fighting the Locusts year after year? It used to be a pretty nice planet, but after years of war, not so much.
8	** No, it's not that everyone's expecting the "long lost colony of earth" reveal, it's that if it isn't a colony it raises a lot of plotholes. If humanity fully evolved on Sera instead of being recent colonists, how did they know nothing about the Locust? How believable would it be if tomorrow we discovered that there's a widespread sentient race under Earth's surface and for all of the hundreds of years that we've been mining and cave exploring we just never found any evidence of them until now? It would make sense if humanity created the Locust, which Gears of War 2 seemed to suggest, but this question was never answered in any of the games.
9	*** Plus the surnames seem to allude to Earth ancestry. There are names of obvious Korean and Spanish descent, for example.
10	*** The 'Korean' names are actually native to Irohma, and Dominic Santiago,as well as Marcus and Baird, are of the Tyran ethnicity.
11	*** Look, IF we assume these people are Human-like beings on an alien world, the chances of them having names with origins tied to human history, which all surnames are, is so insane it almost bears no effort to even consider it. More over, as the above post said, IF we assume this is alternate Earth the very existence of the Horde makes that incredibly unlikely--even if we go with the in-universe implication that we "made" the Locusts somehow, none of it makes sense with regard to their religion, the fact the Locust have their own language, or why no one ever saw the things before. Frankly the Lambent are a far more pressing question. Apparently touching the stuff will cause you to play act the end of Akira, yet humans never realized this when we evolved on the planet...why again? No offense, but the only logical explanation for any of this is that Sera was a colony of Earth at some incredibly distant point in the future, and they can no longer leave or contact home. This makes even more sense when you realize they had TWO world wars, one nuclear no less (Armageddon War or the like, it's clear from the description it was nuclear) which almost led to humanity's extinction on Sera. The most likely scenario is that during the endless wars the colonists lost the ability to leave, or call for help. Whatever government exists off-world may have assumed they all died. That's not all head canon: the Armageddon War did happen, so did the Pendulum Wars, both were so devastating they eclipse even the pair of world wars we had and one of them is explicitly stated to have brought mankind to extinction's doorstep; the Lambent and Locusts are clearly sentient and yet have no place in human history on Sera or otherwise; the flora and fauna of the planet don't fit in to any we've ever known or even would imagine (unless we discovered a race of anti-gravity octopi and no one told the public) so logic dictates we're looking at a world that is at least outside of our solar system.
12	*** ''Gears Of War 4'' just add to the confusion by having a level that takes place in a historic tomb that's supposed to be similar to "medieval" age. Implying that humans been on Sera for awhile.
13	*** ''Gears 5'' just doubles down on the humans are native to sera angle. So what you see is what you get. For better or for worse. Plus the revisited the humans created the locus plot from Gears 2. Which still leaves plot holes in regards to locust having language, and the other native species the locusts seemed to have tamed.
14	** Rumor has it creator [=CliffyB=] intended Sera to be a colony world, but sometime around Gears 2 or 3 they (Epic Games or The Coalition) changed their mind for whatever reason.
15	* Just how long was Tai in captivity for? Since unless "game time" was running fast, the locust broke him in what seemed to be 2 hours, tops. This troper suspects TheWorfEffect.
16	** Tai DID walk out of a crash vehicle while acting as if he barely noticed it, but he ''could'' have just gotten lucky of where he landed, or maybe he intended such a simple escape. He ''is'' a military veteran. But since the torture appeared to be pointless, we don't really know how they tortured him (aside from the big cuts), what they planned for him (or, if they made clear what they planned for him to him), that cell they put him it is ''very'' claustrophobic, and he have no idea he'd escape. Or maybe he saw the conditions of the prison camps and the prisoners, which could have brought him over the edge. If you're wondering about Baird, he probably wasn't imprisoned very long. Plus, with his JerkAss-ness, he's probably pretty close to being as emotionally down as it goes.
17	** Tai couldn't have been in there very long, which goes to show just how ''nasty'' Locust torture really is.
18	*** Yeah, it kinda does sound like TheWorfEffect.
19	** Maybe it wasn't what they did to Tai that made him crack, but what they did to Dizzy and made Tai watch.
20	*** Seeing Dizzy [[MemeticBadass survive something so brutal with nothing more than mild annoyance]] made Tai kill himself because he knew he'd never see anything that awesome again, and felt that his life was complete.
21	*** Dizzy never gets captured. In the Gears of War comic, Tai fights off Skorge long enough for Dizzy to escape.
22	*** FridgeBrilliance: It didn't have to be Dizzy. The Locust had ''many'' prisoners, and evidence suggests that capturing humans is not actually new behavior for them. [[spoiler: For instance, Dom's wife had been missing for years before the events Gears of War 2, and she was malnourished to the point of skin and bones in addition to being tortured into insanity by the time you find her.]] So, they had plenty of prisoners to torture in front of him.
23
24	* This troper is bothered by the bizarre 'breeding farm' theories circulating about Seran women. It is true that within the Gears universe (specifically the comic), there is both misogyny and references to women being sent to 'farms'. But the concept of a breeding farm is more EpilepticTrees than anything. During wartime, plenty of societies will put women to work in munitions factories and on ordinary ''food'' farms (hey, soldiers need to eat). Where did the concept of a 'breeding farm' even originate?
25	** Karen Traviss' abortion of a novel spawned the idea. This is the same novel where the Locust ignore a strategically critical food equipment convoy to kill the half-dozen Gears protecting it, as apparently killing a squad of Gears is more important than starving out all of Jacinto. Yeah.
26	*** Locust drones are supposedly pretty stupid in that regard, to be fair. The idea probably never occurred to them beyond "Gears. KILL!"
27	*** Except that the novel goes on at length as to the drones' actual intelligence and how they were setting elaborate traps, etc., specifically to target the Gears.
28	*** Well, as to that, there are innumerable species on Earth that demonstrate incredible intelligence in very limited areas. Just because something can create elaborate traps to catch prey (ex. many variations of spider) doesn't necessarily mean it'll find a way to herd the prey into the trap. Anyway, thanks for that response.
29	*** That was RAAM's strategy. Kill the Gears and humanity is left with basically nothing to fight with. In addition, the COG had a philosophy after E-Day. If you can't fight, you breed. There're only a few million humans left all in Jacinto, and if the COG wants to strike back at the Locust they need soldiers.
30	** Drones were quite good at TACTICS (smallest scale of battle planning such as traps and ambushes) but total morons about STRATEGY (higher level planning like starving your enemy).
31	** Anyway, there were female Raven pilots in both games, and there was a female gear in Gears2.
32	*** The underground offensive includes a female medic gear...who uses the same model as all the other standard gears, which would almost imply that any of the COG soldiers we see but don't hear could in fact be female!
33	** The "breeding camps" thing pops up in the latest comic issue - only they're ''rape'' camps. COG-operated rape camps.
34	*** Maybe they're only in non-Jacinto area. Hey writers we get it the COG have to do a lot of horrible stuff in order to fight the Locust, we got it when they glassed their own cities, we don't need rape camps.
35	** It's possible it was an attempt to demonstrate the effects of war, of rampant martial law, and the WTF moment is precisely the point - to make us feel uncomfortable that war isn't just violence and badassery, that it isn't just statistics and plans drafted up to win. The use of rape camps or otherwise taking captured women and using them to 'please' the soldiers [[HumansAreBastards has happened in human history. As recent as the 20th century in fact.]] It's not a pretty thing of war any more than torture, indiscriminate bombings, or what have you. It clearly isn't something that all women are subject too (Anya for instance, while not a COG soldier, is a COG and working in logistics), just whatever COG feels are undesirable.
36	*** Really, the problem with the rape-camps is that they're ''not'' there to "please" the troops - it's a medical facility explicitly intended to breed people to boost the population. Leaving out the fact that this effectively pulls a substantial part of the working population out of the workforce, it doesn't work well as anything but a long-term solution when they've already got a limited population that needs to be used in active, wartime duties. It also doesn't help that the "failures" of the camps - women who are sterile - are instead conscripted into the military. In other words, they brutally, repeatedly, and institutionally rape these women and then give them combat training and weapons. Do you see the '''massive''' problems here?
37	*** It's in the C.O.G. nature to do something like that. Given their vague fascist undertone. And quite frankly the C.O.G. has been shown screwing up before. Glassing the planet was a short sighted thing to do regardless of their rational. Which has probably helped the locust depopulate Sera of men women and children, then it did to undermine them. That was '''WORSE'''.
38	*** They're not camps; they're ''farms''. Sera has been in a sate of total war for over a century and in total war NOBODY is a civilian. If you're a woman and can't fight in the Army, then you fight with your body; by being ''paid'' (in rations which are at this point the most valuable thing on Sera) to breed. Of course, giving hormones to 10-year olds is a little extreme but it's not that different from the rest of what [[NukeEm COG]] [[KillSat has done]].
39
40	* Colonel Hoffman. He seems kind of important. He's part of command, he does... something that involves strategic decisions, as it's left kind of vague along with everything else in this game. But he's only a Colonel. Not only that, but his model has 4 stars - the symbol of a General, an O-10. Something doesn't add up here.
41	** "Colonel" is a fairly generic command rank, and we have no idea what the COG's military structure looks like, or what their insignia look like.
42	** It's stated on the Gearspedia page that Hoffman dissed the Chairman before Prescott regarding a mission where non-COG allies were denied medals for aiding the COG in a nasty mission. Hoffman is the military backbone, but for the insult is never promoted beyond Colonel.
43	** And everyone higher-ranking than him is probably dead.
44	*** Karen Traviss is a military fiction writer, and has strong associations with the British military. If you know this, the Pesanga are immediately obvious in their origins: expies of the Nepalese Gurkha regiments that the British government regularly recruits. A lot of punch for a bunch of little guys, check; bushcraft, check; outstanding valor in battle, check; big machete, verily checked (see Kukri); the facsimile is perfect right down to the fact that they were snubbed honors for their distinguished military service. Write what you know and all that.
45	*** In her defense, Traviss said that the Pesangas were really good scouts and stealth troops. That doesn't mean they're superior to the COG.
46	*** They're damn good at what they do, if Anvil Gate has anything to say about it...
47
48
49	* Where is everyone getting all the backstory from? Is it the novel? Is it the comic books?
50	** Lots of sources. A lot of backstory is in the "Destroyed Beauty" artbook for the original game. There's some background info in the comic books, as well as Aspho Fields, though [[FanonDisContinuity whether you consider Aspho Fields canon or not]] is up in the air.
51	*** The novels Ashpho Feilds, Jacinto's Remaint, Anvil Gate, and Coalition's End and The Slab. Also, two comic runs.
52
53	* The Hammer of Dawn, in Gears 1 it seems sort of last resort superweapon, but in Gears 2, we see that conventional gunpowder weapons like rockets, mortars or chainguns simple kicked the asses of all those Locust behemoths just as fine, if not better. So why use Hammer of Dawn? It has crippling restriction, it's not particularly powerful, and does its portability justify the expense for all these satellites?
54	** The Hammer of Dawn you're using in-game is a low-yield tactical weapon. Its portable point-and-click air-support. Talk to ''any'' real-life infantryman, and he'll tell you that having the ability to direct air support at a target with literal pinpoint accuracy at minimal risk to your own person or your squadmates would be a godsend. There are also a wide range of Hammer of Dawn satellites, some with nuclear-weapons-level yields.
55	** Most importantly, it's a weapon that the Locust can't get access to. If a position with rockets, mortars, etc were overrun, now the COG have to deal with Locust with extra rockets. With a [=HoD=], the control key and laser can be sent with people to important locations and the worse that could happen is that they lockout that control and have to build a new one.
56
57	* Here's a funny one I'm surprised nobody mentioned: near the end of the first Act in Gears 1, when Kim gets killed by RAAM, Kim is calling to his squadmates to "Take cover" and "Regroup". Why, then, is he the only one standing up and the only one by himself?
58	** [[CaptainObvious Because he was stuck out in the open and too busy giving his squad orders to take cover.]]
59	** Also, covering fire/distraction - by drawing enemy fire to himself, it gives time for the squad to get away. He probably knew very well he was going to die and figured it was better that one guy die rather than five.
60	** The reason he didn't move was because the street had been torn up by the crashing helicopter, cutting him off from the rest of the squad. He was close enough to the wreck to go around it, but would've run into the advancing Drones if he did that.
61	** [[RuleOfCool Also, firing non-stop at a bunch of enemies while yelling in slow-mo is pretty cool]].
62
63	* How many [[KillSat Hammer of Dawn satellites]] are there around Sera? That little beam that they fire doesn't seem particularly powerful, so maybe they have hundreds, if not thousands of the things in orbit if they managed to scorch the planet so badly. But if there are that many available, why is the lack of an available satellite considered that big a problem?
64	** There are different Hammer of Dawn satellites. Some produce beams mostly used on the tactical level, while others produce beams comparable to WMD. Gameplay-wise, you generally only use the tactical ones because the heavier ones will scorch you as well as your opponents, and probably level the landscape all around you in the process. Imagine trying to use the beam you pack at the end of ''Gears 2'' against the Imulsion-mutated Brumak on the tactical level against an enemy squad inside of ten to forty meters; that thing would boil Marcus and Dom down to the bone.
65	*** It's mentioned in the novels that the Hammer network is deteriorating. And there's only one kind of satellite, but they have variable outputs.
66
67	* Do we have any evidence that the scorched earth policy the government implemented was actually necessary?
68	** The Locust had access to massive amounts of COG hardware from overrun COG bases, and had substantial troop presence on the surface. Anyone not protected by the military was dead anyway. Scorched earth is the only viable alternative in such a situation.
69	*** But how do we know even that is true?
70	*** Because it's ''fact''? Outright stated in the background material? COG ground forces were completely routed. Massive amounts of infrastructure and military hardware are in enemy hands. What other alternative ''is'' there beyond denying the enemy ground, material, and inflicting heavy losses to their forces?
71	*** It also devastated the Locust so badly that they had to retreat underground to get reinforcements. This gave the COG enough time to get to Jacinto and get some organization going.
72	*** Of course the reasoning came from the [[MorallyAmbiguous COG]] [[UnreliableNarrator it self]], so that's where the skepticism comes from. Either way the KillSat bombardments seems more of a PyrrhicVictory.
73
74	* What about the Locust? 14 years into the war, and then they bring out the Worm that can sink cities? Really? They didn't see the value of that sooner?
75	** The back story is scattered, but the worm was supposedly a byproduct of the Lightmass bomb you set off in 1.
76	*** It's hinted that the worm (well, worms actually; there are supposedly ''three'' - well, two now - of the damn things) was hibernating, and the Lightmass Bomb woke it up.
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78
79	* Why didn't the Locusts just hollow out the foundations of the settlements and then they'd all just collapse without, storming out storming the surface and robbing themselves of the initiative?
80	** Because the only human settlement worth noting is Jacinto, which they ''can't'' hollow out.
81	** That is EXACTLY what they did with great success during the opening days of the war. Indeed, E-Day was pretty much them doing this to one settlement after another and then moving on. The only reason Jacinto survived was because the solid foundation upon which it rests apparently is prohibitively difficult to tunnel through, thus forcing the Locust to launch frontal assaults against the fairly entrenched defenses. The plot of Gears 2 was basically their attempt to find something big enough to sink Jacinto and prepare it for the slaughter in a massive project that must have been a massive engineering project and the Gears' discovery that preventing them from doing it was more or less hopeless and the only way to save the city's populace (if not the city itself) was to sink it before the Locust were ready and thus flood the Hollows. TL;DR: They do it all the time. Jacinto was the only city we know of they couldn't do so easily due to the natural protection it lies on, and they eventually found a way to sink it despite even THAT.
82
83	* How come the gears don't have flashlights for use against the Krill?
84	-->'''Tai:''' Might versus light.
85	-->'''Carmine:''' ...Meaning?
86	-->'''Tai:''' That I'd take an extra gun over a flashlight any day.
87	** In the future, apparently, there will be no duct tape. Also, THE FUCKING CENTAUR DOESN'T HAVE HEADLIGHTS.
88	*** What are you talking about? There's a whole scene about its headlights breaking down.
89	*** Well, if you agree with the Mars theory about Sera, [[VideoGame/DooM3 that makes perfect sense.]]
90	** What good are flashlights going to do? The kryll will just fly around the beams and swarm from multiple directions.
91	** They don't seem to be afraid of a little light, as a flood-light or something rather significant is needed to keep them at bay. And even then only the big UV lights like on the APC appear to hurt them.
92
93	* Surely all of the Gears are issued helmets? It's fair enough if you want a better field of vision, but it just seems ''monumentally'' stupid to leave free breathing apparatus at home, especially when you're fighting against enemies that aren't shy about using biological weapons.
94	** Dom and Carmine talk about that in 2. Basically, it's spotting snipers vs. the occasional dust cloud. Doesn't quite explain why the COG doesn't issue the filters alone if the snipers are such a problem they allow the Gears to go around without helmets.
95	** Considering that the helmetless Gears never seem to ever spot snipers until they start firing, it doesn't really seem like much of a justification. Anthony wearing a helmet is explained to be why he didn't see the sniper, but he was shot in the back of the head while behind cover. The helmetless Gears were facing the sniper. It doesn't matter what field of vision the helmet restricted, he was hit from behind, while the helmetless people couldn't see the sniper either.
96	** To answer bluntly, there is no actual justification for the lack of helmets. It seems likely that the main characters don't wear helmets so that they're separated from the [[RedShirt redshirts]] for the player. The conversation in Gears 2 was probably a tongue-in-cheek answer to this question.
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98	* The Lancer's chainsaw bayonet seems to saw straight through enemies' chests in a matter of seconds. So why don't the people who wield them just [[OffWithHisHead go for the neck]] and make it a simple slashing attack? (Yes, it's a matter of balance in multiplayer, but other than that it doesn't make sense.)
99	** Have you ever actually hit someone in the neck or taken a hit to the head or neck? It's quite flexible and you can maneuver it pretty quickly out of harm's way. Plus, it's a substantially smaller target than the torso, which also contains a lot more blood and vital organs, not to mention that the guy you're trying to kill has arms with a weapon or another chainsaw he could train on you. Attacking high for the neck would leave your vitals very open to an attack. Besides, chainsaw's don't cut like swords. They tear out chunks of matter and they are very heavy and dangerous to use. If you hit someone with a heavy implement like a chainsaw in an evasive target like the neck, the last thing you want is for the blade to go through a quickly with all the momentum of your swing, which then goes directly into your thigh (which too has a lot of blood vessels) or into your squadmates. Also, if you've ever done sparring, it's a lot easier to evade a strike aimed at your head or neck than it is to evade someone aiming for your torso. Bottom line: the neck is a tempting, but difficult target to hit with something than cuts by exerting pressure and ripping while the torso is a much safer target to go after and also makes being counterattacked by your victim much less likely.
100	*** That is a very good response for the average soldier in the COG, but the whole "going for the neck" would make a lot of logical sense for the very-experienced ultra-huge protagonists of the games who probably could pull that off. The lengthy cutting is also done because it's brutally [[RuleOfCool bloodier and cooler]].
101	*** Not really. The protagonists are practical individuals who will go for the easier target, which is the chest. The neck is smaller and harder to hit, and when you're in the thick of it, you're going to aim for the easiest target, which is the torso.
102	*** The fact that the main characters are such skilled and experienced soldiers makes it ''more'' likely that they would aim for the torso over the neck. Experienced soldiers only get that way by using the most reliable method of bringing down the enemy; experienced troops in real life, for example, always aim for center of mass when firing. Aiming for the head/neck is something more likely to happen when one is inexperienced and doesn't know any better, while the experienced soldier will hit the reliable target - in this case, chainsawing the torso.
103	** Aspho Feilds mentions that, even for a chainsaw, Locust hide is INCREDIBLY tough. The down-through-the-chest strike is the easiest. The Gear just turns on the saw, puts it to the Grub's shoulder, and lets the saw and gravity do the work.
104	** Well, the [[FinishingMove execution]] for the Lancer in the third game involves placing the blade on the enemy's neck and turning it on. Does that count?
105
106	* Why did Dom kill Maria? She was a prisoner of war. She had been tortured and deprived of food and water for a long time. Of course she's going to look sick. So, upon seeing a POW with a severe case of PTSD, he shoots her. Why? He already expressed that Maria and her safety was more important than his own, more important than than the mission, and more important than Sera. Then how is she too much of a burden? He didn't want her to suffer? It would be considered extremely, ''extremely'' immoral to kill a POW because of the tragedy she's suffered. The state she was in did not necessarily mean that's how she'll always be for the rest of her life. The comics said something about her dying anyway, but that's even more damning in my book: because he didn't know that, it means he had no idea that she would have died anyway. He didn't know what was wrong with her, only that ''something'' was wrong. But without knowing the details, he couldn't possibly fathom how critical her state was. Earlier in the game he was willing to move slowly to protect a box of explosives. But he couldn't move slowly to protect Maria? What would have have done if she were weak, but still seemed sane? Would he have killed her then for being a burden, for being weak?
107	** Maria was so weak that she couldn't hold herself up, and clearly emaciated to the point that starvation was likely close at hand. Her mental faculties were degraded; she was unable to even respond to simple human contact, much less recognize and acknowledge any sort of communication, or more importantly, command. Heck, the scars on her head may have even indicated brain damage. Dom's been a soldier for a long time; he's seen people die from just about every cause under the sun. He knows when someone's time is short, and Maria wasn't going to make it out of the Hollow. Even if she'd been conscious and mobile, Dom and Marcus couldn't go back. They had a mission to complete, and were smack in the middle of hostile territory. She would have never made it back on her own, especially not in her current state, and the couldn't escort her. Dom only had two options: Leave her, to face death (or worse, recapture) at the hands of the Locust, or bring her with them and risk putting all of their lives in danger. Dom didn't kill her because of how much she'd suffered (though that probably helped the decision), he killed her because there was no way he could get her out, and he didn't want her to suffer again. It's very likely what Maria would have wanted.
108	*** If you've ever seen anyone with PTSD, it can be ''very, very'' severe. She is a POW. Being nearly catatonic for a few minutes is not unheard of. She would have died anyway. But Dom didn't know that--he expressed as much in the comic. He didn't even try to save her. Dom had already prioritized Maria over the mission. What if she had been somewhat functional? What if she could speak? Do you think she would have shot her then? My issue is that he didn't even consider for a second that she could be saved. He just shot her.
109	*** Dom has over the course of the series been characterized as a man who is very passionate and not entirely rational when it comes to his friends and family, as evidenced by the fact that he went so off-mission to find Maria. He's quick to react and act. Coupled with what they saw regarding Tai, and knowing how mentally unstable Maria was before she disappeared, Dom seeing Maria in such a state appears to have pushed him over the DespairEventHorizon, and he acted on his passions without thinking. That's in-character for him.
110	*** There is also worth noting that Sera has different ethics from modern day Earth. What Dom saw was a woman who was broken beyond belief. He saw first hand that someone like Tai was DrivenToSuicide as a result of the 'processing'. Maria, a civilian, would have been far worse. Not to mention that she was [[FateWorseThanDeath lobotomized]], quite sloppily due to the way the Locust handle it. As such, she wasn't even her, literally just a walking sack of meat. Dom's action was purely a MercyKill, no matter how much he didn't like the idea of it.
111	** Tai, one of the toughest men in the world, committed suicide after suffering only a few hours' worth of torture at the hands of the Locust. Maria suffered even longer, without the training or mental fortitude that Tai would have possessed. Furthermore, she's an unarmed noncombatant who is in no position whatsoever to assist them in combat, and they're surrounded by literally millions of Locust with no immediate way out. They can't extract her, and they've seen what happened to Tai and other Gears. What is Dom ''supposed'' to do?
112	** It's also probably likely that ThereAreNoTherapists in the limping and low-population COG. If there are any, they're probably already busy with the people who actually can fight or otherwise provide help to human race while they are undergoing treatment where even if Marie could be saved, it'd probably require years and humanity being at a point far above not struggling to survive which the universe just doesn't have at the moment. Shooting her was probably the most realistic thing to do at the time. On the other hand, that ''is'' a realistic viewpoint where Dom's constant search for his wife is fairly unrealistic and naive on it's own. It's a wonder she was alive at all in retrospect, and how she was when found was not all that surprising if she went insane. In that manner, it is kind of strange that Dom's logic suddenly trumped in his long entirely-sentiment search.
113	*** Closure was the important thing for Dom. If he'd known Maria was dead he could have lived with that, but it was the not knowing that was destroying him. Maybe he built up this idealized scenario where he'd rescue her and everything would be fine. Then being faced with the cold hard reality, he just realised how naive he'd been and how hopeless her chances were.
114	*** Have you ever had your dreams crushed to dust? Dom felt that when he noticed that all the fighting he did to rescue Maria was pointless: She was just another lobotomized, starving slave for the Locust. Yeah, he didn't knew if she would survive. But if she DID survived, she would be brain damaged, with scars and sings of abuse for the rest of her life. That excluding possible episodes where her memories could get back to the torture, in a world where the only safe haven of humanity just got sunk down a few hours later. So let's say he saved her. He would probably feel incredibly bad afterwards.
115	** It boils down to there being no right choice only a personal one. The other options they had were they try to take her with them which would be extremely hazardous for everyone or they leave her (which is just as worse). He has no real good options... just a lot of bad ones. Had he any better option that didn't include her getting shot by Locust, he probably would have taken it. As it is, the best he could do was close things on terms he could control in a way he could keep painless.
116
117	* After the conclusion of Gears 3:
118	** What was Adam Fenix's relationship with Myrrah?
119	*** Details are unclear, but they made contact sometime before E-Day, and Myrrah wanted him to come up with a way to stop the Lambent.
120	*** They met three years before E-day after the Locust killed his wife. She told him their Lambent problem, he promised to solve it so they’d wouldn’t invade. He failed to do it fast enough, so they invaded.
121	** Why was Myrrah so human-like compared to the Locust?
122	*** Most likely a result of Niles' research into the Sires.
123	*** She was a descendent of the scientists that created the Locust, not a Locust herself. Through sheer force of will, she took them over and became their leader, calling herself Queen to give it legitimacy.
124	** What was the purpose of the New Hope facility and the Sires within?
125	*** Unknown. Likely something to do with the Locust; Niles mentions something about the Sires being some kind of "genetic bridge: presumably between human and Locust. Better than even chance that Myrrah was created by the project and somehow became the leader of the Locust.
126	*** They were researching Rustlung a century ago. Attempting to fix the problem, they created sires. After being forced to move after being shut down, the research continued and created the Locust.
127	** How did Fenix determine the true nature of the Imulsion?
128	*** [[CaptainObvious Researching it.]]
129	*** The fact it was having a possessive effect on the Locust would obviously raise some questions, and any way to stop it would be to understand what it is. His ultimate conclusion was made after nearly 20 years of research into it.
130	*** He’s a scientist.
131	** Why does Imulsion cause Lambency?
132	*** Lifecycle. Explicitly noted in Fenix's research notes in his office.
133	*** That research also states that Imulsion is a life-form that alters the current definition of "life-form" (no reaction to stimuli and no apparent neural processes). It also has both viral ''and'' parasitic properties, which explains the key plot point that enough exposure to the stuff would eventually cause the lambency effect.
134
135	* So what are the locust supposed to be exactly? This question has been dogging me since Gears of War 1 and Gears of War 3 still leaves it unanswered. All we get as an explanation is some rather vague dialogue hinting that Humans and Locusts may be related somehow, so what are they then? Did humans and Locust share a common ancestor? Are they the result of genetic tempering?
136	** They're another sapient species that has always existed on Sera. Therein ends the explanation.
137	*** Which opens up a whole mess of other questions, like why humans never noticed the locust until they were kicking down their doors, and why the locust never attempted contact with humans until they decided to commit genocide.
138	** They’re a mutated form of humanity created by mad scientists doing research on victims of Rustlung.
139
140	* How did the Locust get into Azura? All the defenses, like the minefield and the torpedo launchers, are still online and able to kill when ''you'' get there, but somehow the Locust have moved a small army there, including air support. There are some Locust boats there, but they probably didn't sail through the hurricane and the minefield in those.
141	** The same way they get ''everywhere'' that isn't Jacinto. They ''tunneled'' and emerged underneath it.
142	*** Wait, so the COG completely fortified the island against invasion by air and sea, but forgot that the Locust (of all creatures) can tunnel?
143	*** Hinted with the books; Locust can't tunnel so close to the sea. You kinda get a mild case of drowned. It's the reason why Vectes wasn't invaded and there were many groups of stranded living off the sea. They didn't permanently have storm up, they must have brought it down to receive ravens and supplies.
144	*** The COG didn't "forget" that the Locust can tunnel. The fact is that the COG can't defend most areas because the Locust can tunnel right through just about anything that wasn't Jacinto. This is stated explicitly in the very first game when they discuss Locust tunnelling: "Command's tried everything, but nothing works." Azura's only real defense was secrecy; once the Locust found Azura, that was it.
145	** The defenses got shut off somehow (Prescott would have had to get off somehow) and the Locust used the opportunity to move in. Maybe the generators went down for lack of spare parts because the COG disintegrated.
146	** The latest comic shows how the Locust took Azura: they discovered some King Ravens scouting the mainland and followed them, discovering the unnatural storm surrounding the island, and watched them bring it down for several seconds so the Raven could pass through safely. The Queen sent an elite team of Drones to swim under the storm using scuba equipment, and they located the generator before being detected and shut it off, allowing an invasion force to land by sea and air.
147
148	* So, why do the Locust fire out of the ground now? Maybe they wanted to get rid of the emergence hole mechanic, but having them rocket 10 feet into the air when they appear seems pretty silly.
149	** How did they manage to do it on a bridge? What, do they sleep under the tarmac or something?
150	** The Locust can't use regular tunnels anymore, because the Hollow is both flooded and because the Lambent are tromping about down there. Instead it looks like they dig small tunnels under ground and then charge up out of the ground somehow. Its likely that they're being assisted by younger Corpsers; maybe the younger Corpsers are the ones throwing them up out of the ground.
151
152	* Why did they "have to" sink Jacinto? Couldn't they have just breached the seawall beneath the city and let the Hollow flood instead of collapsing everything? Maybe the Hollow was a natural formation, not a massive Locust engineering project.
153	** Nope, the Hollow was all done by the Locust. And breaching the seawall would have sunk the city anyway. There were giant holes all around the city, it was going to sink sooner or later, the point was getting all the humans out so they didn't die when it did.
154
155	* Why was Delta not effected by the heavy exposure to imulsion throughout the series? At the end of Gears of 3, Adam's weapon destroys anything 'tainted' by the imulsion- including humans that were exposed to heavy amounts. Shouldn't Delta have been killed too, seeing as they spent a large portion of the first two games wandering through imulsion filled caves, and spend all three games being sprayed with imulsion chunks from enemies?
156	** It seems to affect only after long, systematic exposure. The rig workers in Mercy or the miners in Char must have been in closer proximity to it then Delta were after their brief missions. Notice also how many Locust escaped infection even after living much closer to it their entire lives.
157
158	* So... are we ever going to see the fourth Carmine brother? The trilogy is over now, and we don't even have a name.
159	** Well, they're making a fourth one, so we might see the fourth Carmine after all.
160	** In the "105 Questions and Answers about Gears of War 4" video, Rod Fergusson said that the Carmine dynasty was not dead, so it's very likely that he will show up at some point.
161
162	* Regardingt the Locust Strategy: why is it that RAAM used the berserkers when he was in charge, but Skorge didn't use them? The berserkers seemed to work well for RAAM, so one has to wonder why the second general didn't use them...
163	** The first time you see one it immediately kills its handlers and goes rampaging. Having something that kills discriminitely might not be good to have running around near your own guys.
164	** Alternatively there might just not be that many berserkers, expecially after the Lightmass bombing and Jacinto Sinking so he might not even have any he can afford to use.
165
166	* What differentiates a Locust from just a hostile Seran animal? The Locust are at least the underground dudes with guns, that's an army, but what are the giant worms, the Leviathan, and the Reavers?
167	** The creatures are bionengineered by the Locust from different animals found in the Hollow, surface, and ocean.
168
169	* Where did Imulsion come from?
170	** It is a naturally occuring resource / [[spoiler:life form]].
171
172	* How did Adam Fenix survive getting crushed by rubble in front of Marcus' eyes?
173	** Someone came over and patted him on the back before he bled out.
174	** He was only buried by the rubble and badly injured. The Onyx Guard found him and took him to Azura for treatment.
175
176	* What made all the spiderwebs in the submarine bay?
177	** The giant Serapedes.
178
179	* Is there any firm evidence that Anya can't have children? It's entirely possible, of course, but why, of all people, would ''Baird'' know this?
180	** It's refered to by other characters in The Slab. One effect of Imulsion that Adam discovered is an increased number of women are infertile, without even having been colonized by Lambent cells.
181	** He was wrong. If you hadn’t noticed, Baird is a bit of a sexist douche that assumes he knows everything. He’s essentially a blonde Tony Stark.
182	* Hey, [[BigBad Myrrah]]. Ever considered that you might be able to learn a thing or two about grand strategy, even from [[GeneralFailure Hitler?]] At least he attacked the Soviet Union because war between the two was going to come eventually, most of his military had no other opportunities and the pace of Soviet modernization was alarming. Oh yeah, and he opened that second front up when his men were WINNING the other one. Why the hell did you get the brilliant idea of waging Jihad on all of humanity [[spoiler: WHILE the Lambient who you clearly hate are driving you towards extinction? You had chatted up Adam Fenix for cooperation against the Lambient and even though he hadn't delivered yet, surely you coulda come to some other arrangement against the the Lambient, right?]]
183	** People don't always take the more logical courses of action when they're desperate and feeling like their back is to the wall.
184
185	* Let's have a military trial, even better, let's do it to the people who are currently dealing with the BIGGEST THREAT (this is pre RAAM) ensuring that threat isn't deadified to the max. what the hell?
186	*** Loomis is shown to be a very by-the-book official and considers the Locust to be nothing but animals. Using something as dangerous and powerful as the Lightmass Missle is something that only people very high up in the chain of command would be allowed to approve or even consider, so a lower ranked squad like Kilo using it would be considered treason. Since Loomis doesn't take the Locust as serious opponents, he felt that the Lightmass Missle was way too much force to be used on such a trivial opponent while at the same time endangering the lives of all the soldiers and civilians who were still around. Also, given his by-the-book nature, he justifies in his own mind that dealing with traitors is far more important than some "animals" outside the courtroom.
187	* So... everything about the Swarm. Where did they come from? Were ''all'' swarm specimens captive humans, and if so, what kind of animal evolves to be completely dependent on metamorphosing a completely unrelated creature in order to reproduce? How does pupation work, exactly -- are the Snatchers responsible for all the MeatMoss lying around? How are the Scions able to control them? How did the Scions survive Adam Fenix's anti-Imulsion weapon?
188	** Basically, the Swarm are evolved forms of the Locust. Shortly after the Imulsion Countermeasure was deployed, the COG noticed that the Locust corpses became encased in a ridiculously tough crystalline structure, so they buried all of them deep underground. Juvies and standard Swarm troops are created when humans are placed into Swarm pods, but the Scions are the old Locust that busted through the crystalline structure encasing them. This explains why the Swarm mostly consists of just Juvies, the various foot soldiers (drones, hunters) and Scions. As for the Snatchers, Pouncers and Carriers, it's tough to pinpoint how they were created. They could be wild Seran creatures that were heavily mutated by the Imulsion Counterweapon or the Swarm could've put wild animals in their pods to see if they would turn out different. The Scions are able to control the Swarm because they are all apart of a HiveMind. Since they have faced humanity before, it's only natural that they are the de-facto leaders for capturing them. However, the Swarm could've been active much earlier and could have gradually captured pockets of humans that were isolated from the main concentration that the COG was monitoring and only decided to show themselves when they had a sizable army 25 years after the war. Maybe some supplemental material will shed some light on them soon enough.
189
190	* So, Adam Fenix's superweapon destroyed all the Imulsion at the end of Gears 3, right? And Torque Bow arrows are tipped with Imulsion (that's how they explode), right? So, how are there still functional Torque Bows in Gears 4?
191	** While Torque Bows do contain Imulsion, that supposedly is not why the arrows explode. According to Gearspedia, the tip of the arrow is laced with an explosive material (which seems to be separate from the Imulsion), which is also attached to a short fuse that causes the arrow to explode after sticking a target. Although it also says the arrows are '''Imulsion-fueled''', the properties of the gun go against this claim. There is a series of magnetic coils within the bow that apply motive force to the bolts. When the arrow is being primed, two other things also happen. There is a small motor within the bow that supplies rotational force to the bolts and the blades compress on the barrel to control tension on the motor. When the tension on this motor is released, the arrow fires. However, maybe the "explosive material" actually ''is'' the Imulsion in the arrow. If that's the case, then what you are asking can be answered with a case of GameplayAndStorySegregation. Technically, the Torque Bows shouldn't explode, but they could still function otherwise. But, it's such a staple weapon of the series that it's easier to overlook a story element for the sake of RuleOfFun.
192
193	* In ''Gear of War 3'', what happened to the Imulsion fuel that Delta Squad picked up in Char from Griffin's refinery? This comes off feeling like something is missing when they arrive at the Endeavor Naval Shipyard afterwards to get the submarine, and yet they're suddenly required to go searching for fuel again. Uh, what? Was that fuel they picked up in Char really all used up just to fill the empty truck they were driving around in? What happened here?
194	** The fuel that Delta was picking up from Char was never for their truck, it was all for the submarine. When they rode back to Griffin’s headquarters on the cable car with all the fuel, they discovered that the Locust had followed them and attacked Griffin’s tower. The fuel got destroyed in the ensuing battle alongside Griffin’s people.
195	*** Anya outright says "let's get this fuel back to the truck" after Griffin and Delta part ways, implying that the fuel is still there. No mention of it is ever made after that. My guess is that they probably intended to address it in some way (maybe the fuel they did get from Griffin wasn't enough to get the submarine going?), but changes in the script ended up leaving that part out and they forgot to change Anya's dialogue in that one cutscene.
196	* This is probably a dumb question, but is it possible Dom simply could have jumped out before the crash?
197	** Not really. If Dom did try to jump out of the truck, he would’ve gotten splattered against the walls of the tunnel he was driving though. And if he somehow survived that, the horde of Lambent between him and the rest of Delta would’ve certainly gunned him down almost instantly and he seemed to run out of ammo before; hence why he chose to ram the truck in the first place. Since he was a DeathSeeker at this point in the series, Dom felt he couldn’t do anything more with his life and wanted to go out in a blaze of glory.

Context Headscratchers / GearsOfWar