What Exactly Are the "Combine"?

[Pandorium]

I wonder what an enslaved meteorological intelligence would look like…

[Pyroclase]

A cloud.

[sudpuzzer]

@Marc Laidlaw

Capture of vorts is fairly common. That particular Nihilanth was the last of its kind, and had never been captured, but some of its predecessors might have been.

https://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2503050

Lots of good stuff in this thread, confirmed by Marc Laidlaw himself.

The Nihilanth was the last of it’s kind, the others hunted to extinction by the Combine. It was never captured by the Combine, so it’s appendages and scars and synthetic parts were the result of some other operation. Perhaps that was part of the technology of it’s home world, and the Combine took it and merged it with their own technology, influencing the synths we see in HL2.

His legs appear stunted and withered. Perhaps the mechanical bit under him is similar to a human wheelchair? He can’t move on his own, so the spikes help him move around. Maybe he was attacked by the Combine, and nearly died, but was repaired enough that he could escape to Xen?

[OldDirtyBastard]

@Pandorium

Supposedly, the Advisors were similar to humans and they mutated into that grub form over time due to an over reliance of technology.

Yeah, that’s basically us connected to the internet. Grubs.

[Pandorium]

@sudpuzzer

https://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2503050

Lots of good stuff in this thread, confirmed by Marc Laidlaw himself.

The Nihilanth was the last of it’s kind, the others hunted to extinction by the Combine. It was never captured by the Combine, so it’s appendages and scars and synthetic parts were the result of some other operation. Perhaps that was part of the technology of it’s home world, and the Combine took it and merged it with their own technology, influencing the synths we see in HL2.

His legs appear stunted and withered. Perhaps the mechanical bit under him is similar to a human wheelchair? He can’t move on his own, so the spikes help him move around. Maybe he was attacked by the Combine, and nearly died, but was repaired enough that he could escape to Xen?

I wish they weren’t so ambiguous about some things like canon. One thing I never liked was how Valve is like ‘yeah, this is not canon or non-canon and yeah, this HL3 may or may not happen but we’re just gonna talk about Steam and other things.’ Also, some of that article does appear outdated. But I’m derailing the topic if I rant on about this.

[Xeoxer]

What if Combine are not species, but rather huge multi-species military organization, just like Stroggs from Quake series? There are a lot of similarities with the Strogg: they consist of multiple species, they create cyborgs to make them more efficient in battle, they invade other worlds and include any encountered species into their army, and they use mind-control.

[Dragunov2]

We are borg!

[Pandorium]

@Xeoxer

What if Combine are not species, but rather huge multi-species military organization, just like Stroggs from Quake series? There are a lot of similarities with the Strogg: they consist of multiple species, they create cyborgs to make them more efficient in battle, they invade other worlds and include any encountered species into their army, and they use mind-control.

Well, you’re actually right. It’s been stated that’s exactly what the Combine is. However, I personally would imagine that like any organization, it has a leader. Who or what that leader is, we don’t know. So far, it seems the leader/leaders are the Advisors, although even they may be part of something larger.

[Serza]

A leader… hm…

G-Man’s former mentor?

[Pandorium]

@Serza

A leader… hm…

G-Man’s former mentor?

Who or whatever he works for. When you give that some thought, it’s pretty scary.

[Serza]

I just shit my pants…

That’d be the fucking Almighty.