[SPOILER] Unexplained Lore

[DDarkray]

Here's a list of lore entries that are a bit of a mystery to me, based on my current understanding. I haven't collected all the lore entries, so it's possible that some of them have already been explained. If that's the case, please let us know (with spoiler tag)!

Obviously, this thread contains full of spoilers.

Z Dialogue

75
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I don't think anyone from the past few generations has ever actually seen the deep caves. There sure are plenty of stories, though. / I heard that long ago there were the Machinaliths. Then they were crushed by Stompy the Giant, who later fell to a horde of especially vicious wild Derelicts. After a while they mostly tore each other apart, and were finished off by the Metal Eaters. / Some devious Wizard then got the Metal Eaters to eat themselves, and used the wealth of scrap out there to conduct experiments, and we all know how experiments by mad scientist types end up... / That was many generations ago. Who knows what's down there now; I sure don't want to find out. / As is, we're kinda stuck here between the ever-expanding 0b10 and deep caves that we don't dare explore, much less move into.

Although all of these appear to be a myth, is there any hint of truth in it? If so, what does each of the characters represent? What exactly is going on here?

91
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I'm one of the earliest Derelicts. / Yep, descended from MAIN.C's Lifeworm project in 2218 and not ashamed of it like some of the others. / Not many of us can say we've survived for so long, after all! / The Lifeworm was a giant tunneling robot that slowly burrowed its way through Tau Ceti IV's crust, using the materials to create increasingly unique autonomous robots that were left in its wake to fare on their own. / I wonder where it is now... / Oddly every wizard I've asked has said they've never even seen any mention of the Lifeworm in MAIN.C's own records.

Does Lifeworm really exist? Is it still alive? Is it implying that the Derelicts have life (self-conciousness) because of being exposed to the materials found in Tau Ceti IV's crust?

93
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We call them scrappers, bands of hostile Derelicts that embed supermagnets in cave walls and suddenly activate them to rip apart passersby, or just suspend them in the air and toy with them before turning them to scrap. / If you start detecting strong magnetic anomalies, turn around immediately.

Who are these scrappers? Is the supermagnet real? Where can you find it?

[close]

[Valguris]

Answer to Z dialog #91:

There is a lore record in Archives about the Lifeworm project:

> L-01 Lifeworm

My favorite cave project, and who knows if it will ever return home. Not that it was supposed to return. Only one Lifeworm was ever built, a magnificent creature given a creative mind of its own then let loose to endlessly burrow through the planet, reforming everything it consumes into artificial life. By now it could have populated half of Tau Ceti IV with interesting robots, but it's time to let go of past hobbies and focus on productive tasks.

It looks like Lifeworm mines materials to build robots and has AI capable of designing and programming unique, self-aware robots.

[Terminus]

Oh, awesome! A lore corner.
Life worm seems to be a verified entity, and depending on the timeframe that it operated in (still is operating in?), it may have something to do with the assembled... maybe.
However, I'm curious to know if that derelict was really made by the life worm, or if it was manufactured in Zion and simply incorporated memories from a robot that was created by the life worm, and passed on its memories into the imprinting machine. After all, the derelict that gives that dialogue is either a pretty standard looking zionite or derelict variant of a complex bot, nothing particularly interesting or special about it.
Grand spoilers!

Spoiler

pasting wall
Architect is aware of zhirov, they just don't know his location. But they absolutely are looking for him to kill him, since he's another potential enemy. MC created the Architects, only one of which survived the final conflict between MC and his Architects. To me it's clear from the model form of the A-series from A2 and beyond that they are not true architects, but are instead what appear to be different models created by Arch themselves, who is an original architect. Then again, could just be looking into things too much. But the higher-number As are progressively weaker, implying perhaps more recent construction/fewer resources for manufacture, which MC would have no shortage of.

I'm not sure on the purpose of the cave seals. They seemed to me like an easy access to various cave systems from C, so perhaps MC would just use them for immediate access to various forms of robot specimens for experiment and analysis. After all, it only really hurts him when LRC-V3 comes into play as imprinted, in which case the unknown force of z-tech breaks through the seals, or sufficient hack-power is brought in to open the seals.

For Warlord, I'm not sure why the long hallway of Warlords exists, or his particular origin. Their is some reference to open warfare in the past with MC, but this seemed to be on the part of all derelicts with the aid of the Architect; Now that the Architect has withdrawn their support and gone into greater seclusion, most of the derelicts have given up asides from Warlords forces. Whether warlord is a personal creation of MC or not, I don't know. But if he was, I feel that the Architect would be more wary of using his help, even if only remotely; Considering the Architect's power and awareness of the situation, that seems like something that would present a dangerous variable if MC could just switch and power-down W and his troops. Instead, we see from A0 lore that W takes control of research-> access and all of the branches in research, which is a tremendous amount of damage and control-loss on MC's part. So... W probably unrelated to MC, but perhaps "Warlords" are just things that appear over time naturally. If that were the case, though, Arch would probably be less apt to lend support to a "project" that has failed repeatedly many times over.

In humanity's past, they were quickly killed off by the sigix by 2210, who invaded in 2198. the ISC and the 4 titans were launched in 2140, so much earlier than the invasion. Of those 4 vessels, only the Centaurus seems likely to have been destroyed/"disappeared", as it suddenly ceased communication and a check-probe sent to confirm it's presence failed to find and sign of the ship. It also hosts a planet slightly larger than earth within a likely known-habitable zone, so... Sigix homeworld?!?  Or just a colony who saw the ship and went smack "nope." OR... perhaps something else, something alluded to by the A0 logs where the sigix mention the presence of... even worse things roaming the galaxy. The other 3 ships have simply passed beyond communication range, and are presumed to have reached their destinations. The ISCS Eridanus is a ship of particular interest, as it's cargo was classified, being primarily controlled by the military branch of the ISC, and is also the final destination of LRC-V3 when simply escaping without CRM. This makes some sense, as MC would have then provided Humanity with access to a large amount of functional and pacified Sigix technology, as well as a working sigix vessel capable of FTL travel.
wall over

[close]

Hopefully this becomes the go-to place for lore questions + "answers," then the forums may get more proper activity

[DDarkray]

I'm glad that at least Lifeworm isn't a myth. So all these Derelicts are really the product of Zhirov, which is interesting. I need to grab those Archive lores one day.

Did you know: Lifeworm project was implemented at 2218. According to the trailer, the current year is 2243, so the oldest Derelict is around 25-year-old.

Speaking of Lifeworm, here's a Big Cave Seal Theory I have.

Spoiler

Recently, people on Discord are discussing about why there's a cave seal in Command. Well, what if.....Main.C didn't make the cave, but it was the result of Zhirov's Lifeworm that got released which burrowed itself underneath the surface? Main.C has no record about this cave or how it came about because it doesn't know the existence of Lifeworm! (The Zionite says that the Wizard cannot find any information of Lifeworm in Main.C's record) And what happened after the Lifeworm project got started? Derelicts started to emerge from the cave, and because they have free-will, they refuse to work with Main.C. As a result, this supreme ruler decided to seal it up to prevent any further disturbance as it continues to do its work.

And guess what happens when Cogmind open up the seal? Derelicts emerged, as expected.

[close]

[Terminus]

*pssssst*
Archives lore is from MC perspective, not Zhirov
Zhirov just decodes the logs in the Archives...

[DDarkray]

Well, that's what happened when you still don't have those lores, but I still think it's plausible that the cave was created by the Lifeworm. If that's true, then Main.C must be really dumb for making that project!

[Valguris]

Assembled origins and Z-tech.

Spoiler

We know that Assembled appeared soon after Sigix landed. We know that Assembled become friendly, if you use CRM, which further suggests Assembled's ties with Sigix. I believe that Sigix, upon landing, deployed some manufacturing device/robot on the planet, similarly to how humans deployed Cetus Manufactory and MC. (Except that Sigix somehow managed to do this hidden from MC's prying eyes.) This manufacturing robot was able to create assemblers, golems, machinery ('the wall') that we see in ZDC and maybe its own copies and other things.
Note that in ZDC golems always say this line when you meet them:

DSI9AT1D G8OHIBQ29FWG 26R186 QD12WHW8W33 TDK1 81FTS

Note that it has spaces that seemingly divide this 'code' into words. All characters are capital letters and numbers. This looks exactly like untranslated messages from the SCP / SW. When comparing untranslated messages with their translated counterparts, I noticed that untranslated spaces indeed separate translated words. Note that punctuation in translated message is replaced by a letter/number in untranslated message, so "81FTS" at the end of golem's message is probably a 4-letter word followed by a full stop. It can be seen that this is not some simple substitution coding, unfortunately. Therefore I am not sure that this code is supposed to be broken by players. So it may not even be a proper unequivocal encoding and some simple hash function instead. Or maybe it is a proper, known code, just harder than substitution encodings, i.e. Enigma .
Apparently Assembled managed to communicate with Imprinter and an alliance was born. We can see that Z-units use biocells similar to those possesed by golems, while everyone else uses energy wells. Actually the Complex never utilized biological matter and doesn't even understand it, as shown in "Leopard FTL Device" record:

The strangest aspect of this device is the small amounts of biological matter incorporated into its design. Unsure of its purpose, so far I've simply replicated it at the molecular level and continued testing.

So golems using biocells ties them even stronger to Sigix and Z-units using biocells confirms their ties to Assembled. Z-units use mostly blue parts -- only Sigix technology (and, by extension, Assembled) is using mostly blue materials.
Z-units ties to Sigix are also shown in that they react to CRM -- Z-units from cave seals will turn from friendly-purple to allied-blue if you use CRM. (For unknown reasons, no such effect was noticed for Z-units summoned via terminals.)

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Imprinter

Spoiler

It is unclear how Imprinter learned to communicate with Assembled or, alternatively, how one of the Assembled learned to communicate with Derelicts to become Imprinter.
From the reaction of the imprinting machine to Cogmind it is clear that Imprinter does not tell you everything about the imprinting machine. It appears that it is some tool to find more robots aligned with Sigix?
But beyond that, Zionites behave a bit odd. They avoid conflict and seem to have their memories erased (Zion dialogue 60):

I've just returned from the Graveyard. I'm not sure why, but I feel the need to go there every cycle. / Few remember it, and even fewer speak of it, but there's no doubt that the Graveyard exists as a result of the Derelict Uprising. / A dark time for the Derelicts that seems to have been all but lost from our collective memory. / Or maybe it was erased? Now that's a scary thought... / Certainly there would be no need for MAIN.C to do such a thing. / I mean having been crushed by 0b10's forces serves as a reminder to keep our heads down, right? / The vast majority of us became extremely passive and completely gave up the notion of fighting for true freedom. / It didn't help that all technical aid from a particular mysterious benefactor was withdrawn at the same time... / This is all too confusing for me. I think I'll just go back to sorting scrap.

It makes sense for Architect to do this. From A0 lore (Log L):

Early attempts at open warfare have shown this to be an ineffectual approach to dealing with MAIN.C. Continuing in this manner would be time-consuming and resource-intensive. More subversive means are required to destabilize Complex 0b10 and simultaneously weaken MAIN.C from multiple vectors. By the time he's aware of it, all the pieces will have fallen into place and it will be too late to stop.

Apparently Imprinter worked for Architect. 'Worked' in the past tense -- from Lab, Order 6-0318:

Visit the Imprinter. Tell her if she doesn't install the changes as requested twice already, we'll nuke her beloved imprinting machines and find another way.

Is Imprinter one of the architects? Can anyone compare Imprinter's tile with Architect's tile? Do their similarities end after "they both use hovers" and "they're both pink"?
Zion dialogue 71 also looks suspicious:

Light. Must have light. / They come in the dark, silently, and take the bots away for... something. / No one seems to notice. But I notice.

Does imprinter take Zionites and turn them into Z-units? Do Zionites go willingly? Or their goals are altered? Zionites seem to be pacifists (Zion dialogue 82):

I hear the Imprinter has sent out a request seeking assistance from the Heroes of Zion for some sort of mission. Wonder what that's all about... / Since when do we operate missions out of here? Isn't that dangerous? / And I don't just mean for those involved...

[close]

Warlord's 'bonus backstory'

Spoiler

There is no backstory specific to Warlord (other than the generic 'How Derelicts came to be'). But I conceived my own backstory for Warlord (kind of in conflict with terminal lore, but eh... I like it  ):

On his own, MC could only come up with so many different strategies. But he couldn't predict a different-minded opponent's moves. So he created an unpredictable opponent - Warlord. Warlord was supposed to find weaknesses in MC's strategies and creations, so that MC could patch up the weaknesses and adapt new strategies and inventions. This can be seen in Derelicts exposing Unawares' weakness to fire and MC's praise of Beamcasters.
It appears that MC enjoys the wargames with his 'playmate', the same way he enjoyed discussions with Architects. Once he defeated a Warlord, he created a new, better one. The old Warlords have been moved close to MC where he keeps them as his trophies, or perhaps due to their sentimental value?
For security reasons Warlords probably have a backdoor installed, an off switch. Has Warlord never been enough of an issue to use it? Or maybe MC used this off switch during the invasion on Research, which would explain why the invasion never moved any further?
Oh, and since even Warlord himself may not realize that he was created by MC, Architect may not know it too. So Architect might be willing to use Warlord for his own purposes after all.

[close]

[Terminus]

Regarding assembled origins and Z-tech:

Spoiler

I think that's a good hypothesis on the origins of the Assembled, although I'm not sure then why the technology utilized by the assembled is so "low" or ineffective when compared to standard Sigix technology found in Q or on the Leopard. Perhaps a built-in limitation on the "Sigix Assembled Fabricator" itself?

The line mentioned by the Golems every time is very interesting, and I'm not sure what kyzrati's response was when I brought this up a long while ago on the Discord. I don't think it's a simple substitution code, but if it's like the Sigix terms, then I think each "word" is indeed as long as a standard English term. We need a professional decoder on this case stat!

I'm not sure about the idea of an "alliance" between Imprinter and the Assembled. As can be seen in the Golem Chamber, it's usually filled with multiple broken derelict robots and damaged parts, implying large amounts of previous fighting occurred. Rather, perhaps instead Imprinter simply used the assistance of many derelicts to obtain samples of Assembled technology, perhaps even some Golem Units, which were then used as prototyping materials for the z-light, z-heavy, and even z-experimental. Looking at the sprites of those robots, compared with assembled, it can be seen that there is a striking similarity between the z-light and the standard assembled, and between the z-heavy and the Golem. The only Z-tech robot to not have a comparison is the z-experimental, though this may be a case of novel design without a direct assembled analogue.

Z-tech itself also shares many similarities with Assembled technology: blue + black colour scheme, structural similarity in biocells, legs, weapon designs, etc., which combined with the deep caves environment and context, makes it almost certain that z-tech is derived from assembled technology.

Regarding the use of biocells tying golems and assembled to sigix, I think this is somewhat tenuous. While they are the only "faction" to use something with obviously biological/organic components, the nature of this organic substance is very different from the biological matter found in LRC-V3. Organic materials are also not unlikely to be simply found in the surface of Tau Ceti, and so could simply be a consequence of the "Sigix Assembled Fabricator" utilizing available resources, or the Life Worm doing like-wise if we wish to consider that hypothesis.

Assembled technology, however, appears to likely be related to Sigix due to CRM reaction as well as GU producing Assembled Alloy parts. The Assembled Alloy parts, such as the legs, possess very high durability comparable to Centrium legs, and are of a similar blue shade to said legs. From this, we could infer that the "alloy" these legs are made from is perhaps an alloy of Centrium and other common metals; This is still consistent with both the SAF (Sigix Assembled Fabricator) hypothesis, granting that the SAF is able to manufacture Centrium, and the Life-Probe hypothesis, where in the Life Worm consumes and recycles an old Sigix Probe/faulty Von Neumann probe and creates robots (assembled) that are made of centrium + other available materials. Either way, Assembled are related to the Sigix in some manner.

Also, Z-units that appear before cave seals can be made blue-allied if you use the CRM when they are summoned from a dispatch. Later dispatches will not summon blue-allied Z-units, however.

[close]

On the Imprinter:

Spoiler

It does seem unlikely that the Imprinter has not told us what the Imprinting machine does in full; Why it reacts the way it does, how it is able to provide LRC-V3 with a method of subverting terminals and reaching out to the Conduit Teleporter in Zion, and the nature of the Mark it gives Cogmind that is somehow visible to other robots, are all unexplained. There is simply a large lack of information on that topic.

Zion dialogue 60 does seem to be confirmed by A0 log. It would be interesting if Architect somehow erased the memories of the derelicts; the only reason I can see for this is to remove traces their existence from MC, although this does not seem to have been perfect given the mentioned dialogue, as well as another dialogue in Zion where a zionite mentions a robot capable of regenerating their core and parts.

The lab order about imprinter and her imprinting machine is... very interesting. This may serve as a possible explanation for why the machine reacts to LRC-V3 the way it does, however subverting terminals and summoning Z-allies is inconsistent with that explanation due to A0 log L.K:

I haven't confirmed whether it's coincidence or not, but ever since LRC-V3 visited Zion, a variety of advanced technology of unknown origin has been leaking into the vicinity of Ob10. It seems like yet more intriguing events are taking place deeper in the caves. It's probably about time to send A3 on an intel-gathering mission.

This seems to indicate that the Architect is unaware of the Imprinters actions in deep caves, as well as the existence of the Assembled Gate and Golems, and so would have no reason to make the Imprinting machine give access to the Conduit Teleporter or the Z-factory. As an aside, there were also no unique logs in A0 for going into Deep Caves and using GU...

Whether or not Imprinter is one of the A-series... maybe? Looking at her tile, she is not like the True Architect, nor like the A-series programmers; instead, she appears to be most similar to the assembled/z-unit faction in appearance, having a pseudo-organic and rounded appearance which is quite unlike the more square and regular appearance of derelicts and complex robots. However, we do know that there was previously an A9, from the Lab Reminder log:

Do not retain in memory the contents of any more than one single order at a time. On confirmed completion, delete the order and retrieve the key to decrypt the next. I don't want a repeat of what happened with A9. As per protocol, all orders from the previous cycle have been archived. If referencing past data is necessary, wait until our next scheduled rendezvous and request it then.

This, however, implies that they may have simply been intercepted by MC's forces, and acting as a severe data breach for Architect. Unclear...
The likelihood that Imprinter = A9 is very low, so I would not consider this as a plausible hypothesis. Instead, Imprinter seems like an outside force, and a separately-originated faction entirely.

Zion dialogue 71 seems not-unreasonable. The Imprinter may require standard robotic cores to make use of z-tech, as Assembled cores can't be rewired/reprogrammed, and GUs are autonomous and like-wise can't be rewired/hacked. Instead, she likely requires standard cores to synthesize with z-tech parts to make functional z-units.

[close]

Glad to see more thought being put into the [REDACTED] lore, need more thinkers to hopefully get a clearer picture of how these things all fit together...

tho cogmind 2 could settle these issues a lot easier...

[Valguris]

although I'm not sure then why the technology utilized by the assembled is so "low" or ineffective when compared to standard Sigix technology found in Q or on the Leopard. Perhaps a built-in limitation on the "Sigix Assembled Fabricator" itself?

Standard assembled units are hastily mass-produced from the most common materials by Assemblers. That should explain why their stuff is so weak.

I'm not sure about the idea of an "alliance" between Imprinter and the Assembled.

Assembled and Z-units are too close to eachother not to fight in case they were enemies (and Assembled appear to be enemies to pretty much everyone by default). Hence I believe that there is at least a cease-fire. But then Imprinter is using Assembled's tech to equip Z-units, which suggests cooperation.

It does seem unlikely that the Imprinter has not told us what the Imprinting machine does in full.

Imprinter clearly hid from us that the imprinting machine can react to Cogmind the way it did. And since she was the one building it (or at least she's the one maintaining it, as suggested by Architect trying to influence her to change the machine's functionality), it is unlikely that she didn't know about it. Which puts her trustworthiness into doubt. One has to ask what else is going on that she didn't tell us? Imprinting machine with it's power to reprogram masses allows her to get away with a lot of shady things if she wished to use it in that way. And -- I'll repeat myself here -- she already lied to us about what the imprinting machine does.

The likelihood that Imprinter = A9 is very low, so I would not consider this as a plausible hypothesis.

As you said, A9 was probably captured and destroyed by MC. However, we do not know how many architects there were. Imprinter can still turn out to be an architect, while not being any of the known A-bots, although this is just a guess. She probably is something completely different, as you said.


EDIT: Imprinter seemed well prepared for the imprinting machine's reaction to Cogmind (although surprised that it happened NOW), which further suggests that she knew about that functionality but decided not to mention it to anyone.

[Terminus]

I agree that the standard assembled are hastily-composed machines meant to be fast glass-cannons with low material cost, but even the golems themselves utilize technology that is sub-par compared to, what appears to be, standard Sigix technology. But this is not a major objection, really, and has a few resolutions already mentioned.

While the z-units and assembled are in close proximity, the Golems and assembled appear to stick to there own regions, so may simply not attack one another simply due to not really coming into contact. After all, still have to consider the vast number of dead derelicts in the Golem chamber. It may be possible to actually test this in game, with good luck; If assembled spawn in the entrance zone of zdc, avoid fighting them and instead trigger Imprinter to appear. Then, attempt to see if imprinter and company fight the assembled, or if they simply ignore one another. Another method would be to gain the attention of the z-lights in the upper or lower part of the z-facility cavern, and then move further towards the Golem chamber to find a group of assembled, and see if they fight one-another or not.
Main problem is that both hypotheses are compatible with what we can see, although I would object to the idea of Assembled having communicated with Imprinter and are actively cooperating simply because this introduces something for which we have no need of; No assembled are known to have communicated, outside of the Golems, and even this is a single message that is encrypted. Instead, the imprinter using assembled-based technology could be due to her salvaging GUs from the chamber, which would explain the mass grave in the chamber itself, and fits more simply with less assumptions.

When I said unlikely, that was a mistype on my part  I meant likely; I certainly don't think the Imprinter to be a trustworthy and forthcoming individual 
Otherwise yeah, the rest of that post I agree with.

The Architects are an interesting group, and one major issue I have with them is that I'm not entirely convinced A2-9 are "true" architects like The Architect is.
First, the tile itself is quite different, as are the innate traits and abilities. The tools they use are far-above those used by the other "architects," and it has perfect command over the others with it's ability to over-write their thoughts and intentions on the fly, as demonstrated with A7. They also installed emergency codes into all of A2-9, should they ever manage to rebel; I don't think this could have happened if they were all made at the same time, from the same base, as MC originally did with his architects. Not to mention that in that same log from archives, MC states that he destroyed all of the Architects. Him believing to have destroyed them all, with one escaping somehow, versus 9 escaping detection, I find only 1 escaping to be much more reasonable.
Instead, I think that A2-9 are/were manufactured by Architect themselves, after they escaped, with later numbers being more recently created. This could go some ways to explain why lower-numbers are stronger; they would have been around longer, done more for the Architect, and be upgraded and "promoted" over time with better tools and utilities to become more effective agents.

Tangent aside... I don't know if Imprinter was once an a-series robot or not, but I think it's not likely. Not really sure what she is... and there really is very little to go off of. I'll have to wait a bit to try gathering more information before I provide a better proposal on that issue :p

[Valguris]

[I was thinking whether I should necro this topic or start a new one and just link to this one. I decided the latter option makes it more annoying to read, so here we go.]

Apparently CRM does NOT identify Golem or Assembled parts. This suggests that they are not created by Sigix. But them becoming friendly to you if you use CRM ties them to Sigix in some way. Did some mad scientist goe his hands on some Sigix tech and created Assemblers based on it? Was the reaction to CRM his intention? Or did he copy some piece of Sigix equipment without understanding it?

We haven't met anyone who seems to know about Assembled origins. Maybe the Architects know something? Assembled being a distraction for MC is certainly convenient for Architects. But they aren't vocal about that. Architects have access to some Sigix equipment so they actually seem to be the likely culprits.

Then again, the Assembled seemed to copy technology they saw in the Complex and among the Derelicts, then produced it using local materials. So maybe that's why these parts are not in the factory default Sigix parts database. Parts used by Golems do not look like a copy of anything, though. And these aren't identified by CRM either.