The Witness: "If The Guardian has a million haters, I'm one of them. If he has one hater, it's me. If he has 0 haters, I have died. If the world is against The Guardian, I am with the world. If the world is for The Guardian, I am against the world."
The Witness sees the species not touched by the Traveler as a simple harvest. But those that are, are an insult to the Final Shape. We defy the pattern and dare to offer a different truth. It's personal
We are also quite literally the child of the Traveler, the biggest enemy of the Witness. “The universe makes us all victim and perpetrator of its infinite cruelty”, but the Traveler more than any is the biggest protagonist of this suffering. We are the embodiment of the pain of the universe, the Witness hates not only us but also what we represent, everything the Witness wants to end basically.
He probably also really hates humanity now because they've interacted with both the Traveler and the Veil and aren't coming to the same conclusion as him.
@@davida1229 To some entity that craves absolute order in the universe, an entity that "makes its own fate" is chaos incarnate, and anathème. By any means necessary, the Witness would see everything under the Traveler tormented before snuffing out that life, a most sadistic evil trifle. And that's if we, the Guardians, do not see the merit in their "final shape" and come to serve them to that end.
@@SelecaoOfMidasexactly in the unveiling the gardener was the entity that was upset with life game results and decided to alter the way it played without consulting with winnoer the ender the true final shape who accepts how the life game played. The Witness is causing the chaos the instability just like the gardener did. The guardian the winnoer unfortunately is to stop it. The Witness know all this and it is trying to prevent the guardian the winnoer from waking up to its strength by fair and cruel methods. Yet the winnoer/Guardian still stand
"Why do you think you can weild Light and Dark, while the rest of us are consigned to one?" - Savathûn. That question has been living rent-free in my head since I heard it, and I bet the Witness is wondering too...
@Blackarot. yes, we were offered the darkness, but we twisted it for ourselves. No other being wields both, only one at a time. I'm sure the witness thought we'd take up the darkness and reject the light, killing our ghost to sever the connection.
I mean keep in mind the Traveler is willingly giving us what the Witness wants. To wield light and dark at the same time. I feel like that just adds more that it's gonna hate us even more.
"We | the Noesis existed." That line is terrifying. Imagine your entire species' existence, your history, your art, your influence on the world, completely and utterly erased in seconds. Imagine being scrubbed from footprint of the universe at the subatomic level such that the only proof you even existed was the lone record of a single person simply stating that you did. Stellar writing by the lore team, as always.
I will always stan for the lore team. their ability to turn plotholes into plotpoints is second to NONE. This whole subject used to be a plothole: "why didn't the witness just kill us all in a second?" and then they made this banger.
It feels like they borrowed that line from Final Fantasy XIV, the last line of a villain. I won't say more than that, but it feels like a "Hey mind if I copy your homework". Not to say it's a bad line. It's definitely *COLD*.
Oh, trust me. - the feeling is very mutual. Bastard stole my catalyst grind spot in the Whisper before it got overtaken by the darkness (i.e. sunset) before returning.
That transcript from the Arcadia jumpship pilot really shows why a being like Nezarec would ally with The Witness. While the swift eradication of entire species would appease a Disciple like Rhulk; these grand campaigns of hate and terror, the utter snuffing of the flames of hope under the suffocation of despair would have fed Nezarec like an all-you-can-eat buffet exclusively for him. Also, the Bungie writers can really fucking cook with these lore entries. The words of that pilot made my stomach twist.
That is likely why Nezerec was the vanguard of the collapse (and likely the Whirlwind as well) it is his job to utterly _break_ those who the traveler has uplifted.
Not before we pack our own Ghost...after Lightfall...it feels like a liability more than an Ally...oh hell...Theory: Thats EXACTLY what we do...The time jumping we did with Osiris, the time we find OUR grave, how does a Guardian truly die again? They lose their Ghost and die one last time and weve seen just how easly our Ghost were taken over by the Witness...I think the Final Shape will be our Guardians final resting place because in the end we will have to destroy our Ghost or it sacrifices itself while it still has the capability to do so of its own accord to finish the Witness, and likely so deep within the realm the Witness creates, we dont escape.
Oh what the heck, I was thinking that today Who would win: A multi billion year old eldritch entity set on reducing the universe into its personal ideal vision Some person who's practically a 9 year old given a few guns
“I got cool powers to give right?” “Right” “So they are better than what the Traveler gave you” “Makes sense” “So you’ll join me cause I have more power” “Guardians make their own fate”
"So you'll join me cause I have more power?" "Nah, you're just flavor of the month for us in terms of powers and we'll kill you because you'll make a cool gun."
It took merging an entire species to make the universes's biggest narcissist holy moly imagine causing the exact same pain and suffering that drives your hatred
@@SelecaoOfMidas exactly, it's not just a hivemind of people in their natural state, there are heavy implications that anything that wasn't final shape-related in the people that became the Witness was left out. Basically the Anti-Spiral from Guren Lagann
"In all my years of conquest, violence, slaughter, it was never personal. But I'll tell you now, what I'm about to do to your stubborn, annoying little [system]... I'm gonna enjoy it. Very, very much."
@@shrodingersgat2754 like if Zavala, Mara, or someone else was giving the witness a monologue and out of no where the witness spurts “BITCH you think I give a fuck?”
@@shrodingersgat2754I mean, the closest we got was the Witness literally screaming “ENOUGH!” at Calus cause he got sick of Calus’s shit. And then, of course, we got to see the Witness (or at least his Shadow) transform into something much bigger and much more frightening, enough to make Calus literally tear up in fear.
Alright, seeing as none of yall have commented about this, can we all talk about Byf's editing? And his VOICE ACTING?? I mean, holy shit, the static added in while he reads the Grimoire, and his overall voice acting? Good Lord, it's gotten so good.
You have a really low bar for voice acting and editing that is "so good". His production value has increased since he started, but he's not a professional voice actor, and I'm pretty sure he hires editors
I'd say the voicing when the guy gets angry at the Traveler for not doing anything is where that shines. For a non-professional, that's some really voice acting.
@MrNoble1997 No one is paying him to put a little extra spice into his readings. He could have just read it in his normal voice, but he didn't. For me to do any level of voice acting would be massively stepping out of my comfort zone! He did a great job, and it sounded fantastic. He should be applauded for putting in the extra effort. I feel sorry for you, that you can't see that. Maybe try pulling your head out of your own ass and appreciate the effort someone put into a free production for your benefit. Plus , it smells much nicer out here.
Odysseus: you are hated by god too? Guardian: i took their stuff. Odysseus: i killed the son of one of my gods and disgraced them Guardian: ...i've done that too. *both continue to get tormented by their respective gods wrath*
I am SO GLAD that I was not the only one who made this connection. "For your arrogance, you will drift on my sea for an eternity; never again will you reach the shores of Ithaca. You will suffer. I want you to suffer much more."
Both the Eliksni and Humanity 'enjoyed' the benefits of the Traveler, BUT neither species did as the Precursors did (and both were never given the time to do so, by the Witness's attack) But whereas the Traveler left the Eliksni, and the survivors fled in pursuit. Humanity on the other hand were saved in the 1st attack by both the intervention of the Traveler, and the deception of Savathun. I believe the malice of the Witness is provoked by the idea that ANY species being co equal to the Precursors in receiving the Travelers 'Blessings'. The Witness, by engaging in malice, by indulging in hatred has proven itself to be weak, and in this weakness to be less than the sum of it's parts. The Witness is NOT the Winnower, merely a self indulgent weak facsimile. It will fail, and it will fall.
That's what I was thinking too, they're a bunch of space assholes compacted into one who couldn't fathom that destroying the universe and remaking it in their image would drive away the traveler. I would love to see the guardian cuss them out mid monologue.
That's what I had in mind as well when we had the cutscene of the Witness absolutely losing their shit at Calus. By indulging in it's wrath to the point it not only shouted at their subordinate, but quickly used fear and terror on him, it shatters any idea that the Witness was anywhere close to what the Winnower and Gardener are, it's no longer a "god" but a higher power of being that is so self indulgent in their goals.
Yeah because I was thinking this has to be out of jealousy or envy that the Traveler sees the Guardian or even Humanity as worthy as the Precursors felt when they first discovered it. Honestly you see how both civilizations find the Traveler in similar ways on a lone planet but for US it seemed like the Traveler WANTED us to notice it in our Solar system from how it deliberately avoided Earth until we became aware of its presence, like c’mon it knew we were there according to lore it seemed like it would get close to Earth and then go to another part of the system kinda like a pattern, the Witness found it half buried by coincidence… yes it blessed the Precursors with gifts too, out of maybe obligation from them helping it be freed, Whereas it looked to Humanity as its worthy saviors in its dying breath instead of fleeing as it did to the Witness.
That acting of the despairing survivor in his ship was incredible. It felt incredibly sincere, moving away from the mic to mimic the frantic walking someone in such a state of mind would do.... That was one great scene, Byf, I'm very impressed!
I believe Eido is still missing a point here. The Witness doesn‘t commit these atrocities because it hates everything the Traveller has touched. Rather I belive it commits to these acts as a demonstration to the Traveller that it‘s philosophy is wrong and only creates Chaos and Suffering. The Witness intends to grind the Traveller down, to hit it right in the spot where it hurts most: The Travellers love for the life it fostered. It‘s a battle of philosphies neither can‘t back down from, lest they admit defeat. The Traveller HAS to move on to other systems and life-forms to prove its logic to the Witness. The Witness HAS to torture and decimate the life the Traveller touched to prove it‘s logic to the Witness. It‘s the Flower Game in it‘s sheer brutality. But now things are different. The Traveller gave in and made it‘s Last Stand. The game is broken and the Witness in it‘s greatest hour of victory will soon realize, that a breaking of this cycle births new possibilities and other ways.
My favorite parts of Eido lore is when she goes off on a side tangent about human things. Like words she can’t pronounce or the waggling eyebrows. It’s really cute.
Yeah, his analysis was absolutely what helped spur me to my final thoughts on the Winnower vs Witness question. I'm so glad he jumped in and took a big look at it because his thoughts are such a great reinforcement to my own understanding of things...
AAAHHHHH.,..... VENEXETRON.... MY FAVORITE! VERY GLAD.. (NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH GLADD UA-camR HAHA LOL) THEIR UA-cam CHANELL GOT MENTIONED HERE... TWO LORE PEOPLE MERGING INTO ONE! HUZZAH!
In fact -- once Contest Mode is off, Im gonna try and complete the Raid and standing in front of banner placement of Final Encounter - blare that video into in-game VC off my phone 100% Volume
In the 3rd account, it mentioned something about a sickly green light, I find it interesting and relate it to savathun and the accounts we know she had during the collapse, there’s another piece of lore saying that savathun reach out to a simple human family before the arrival of the traveller, telling them to sing a song and unknowingly create a hive spell that would somehow ensure humanities survival and the creation of the last city, and of course we know she killed nezarec, caused his ship to crash into the moon and stole the veil. It’s my personal head canon that the this sickly green light was this spell that the family was creating over time until the collapse, and that this spell trapped the traveller on earth, effectively cornering it to fight back.
I'm actually really glad that the Witness was written this way; as an all powerful entity, ultimately full of hypocrisy as it chases the thing it loves to hate across the universe. It's like a jealous ex boyfriend unable to accept the fact that she's moved on, and furiously insisting that only he can truly fix her. Meanwhile we're the Traveller's new side piece, and that's painted a massive target on our backs. It makes the fight a whole lot more personal, instead of just us fighting an abstract entity devoid of character.
On the contrary, that really cuts down on the complexity and impressiveness and scale of a story of primordial forces being bent by an ancient eldritch being's will. The simplification of this conflict just shows how out of their depth Bungie's current writers are in grand, sweeping space epics - they have to reduce a nigh-godlike ancient entity down into to the equivalent of a jealous ex on a rampage, rather than attempting to go anywhere alien and hard to conceptualize but display it understandably for others. It's also why the Vex have been sidelined so hard, because with the current established Vex lore they fall perfectly into something so foreign and alien to us that trying to write for them is difficult if you can't warp your mind to view things from a perspective close to theirs. I don't blame the writers for these. It's a tough task, and not everyone can incorporate extremely difficult and foreign concepts into their writing.
@@trashjashfor sure but maybe there’s more to come out of the Witness. We heard “voices” in Shadowkeep and Beyond Light that wanted to give us Darkness, even saying it was thanks for enduring for so long under the Light. It was as if they viewed us as kindred spirits, and we know not everyone who makes up the Witness had the same ideas. We might see more varied opinions from the Pyramids or even the Darkness itself
Tbf the traveller has just dipped at 2 other species instead of helping them and correct me if I’m wrong rasputin crippled the traveller to stop it from leaving us too
I've been saying over the years, that the Darkness (later, the Witness) was starting to sound more and more like a jilted Ex. Been saying that since Beyond Light. This lore is only reinforcing that belief.
@@empiyrr2133 Rasputin activated neither the Abhorrent Imperative nor the Loki Crown protocols. They were possibilities during the Collapse, but they were not used. The Traveler chose to stay
Couple of things... Cayde 6 being killed seems less and less like a random story event and more a machination of the witness to inflict us pain. He was just about the only character left with actual memories of the collapse with a close personal tie to us. On the subject of the Pyramids being invincible to ordinary (causal) beings and weapos.. this is precisely why the Traveler made ghosts and guardians. It knew that to take his nemesis down he needed paracausal entities....fast forward to season of defiance and we are now able to pass through said invincible ships by dipping in and out of the ascendant plane which sounds an awful lot like the pocket dimension talked about where the bullets get lost to.
After all, during Shadowkeep the Witness specifically mocks the death of Cayde to show how weak the light is. Even if it was a random event, the Witness definitely took advantage of it.
Well, I guess Osiris finally has his answer as to why the Witness let us live. Though, while he’ll probably be greatful to Eido for her findings, probably say something like, “To defeat thy enemy, we must know thy enemy”, he’ll probably be terrified hearing this truth: that the Witness let us live not because the Traveler was it’s primary target, or that we were to weak to bother fighting. But rather, to prolong our suffering to do the most amount of physical, emotional, and psychological pain. Because it hates us.
Wait, I thought the only reason we are chasing the Witness into the Traveller was to shave their uni-brow. I don't care what they do to make the final shape happen, as long as they look good while doing it
oh god now I have the mental image of a titan leaping at the witness thundercrash-style with a razor clenched in his fist and shaving cream in the other, aiming for that unibrow
We definetly need to see cutscene where Witness is making ''I am inevitable and final shape is here'' speech, and our Guardian shoot Witness wounding it and that makes it loose its dam cool so dam much that it rages on how we dare damage a god.
When Eido says "the witness wants to ruin everything the Traveler has touched" is very interesting...I wonder if that's why the first contact we had with the black fleet ,back in shadowkeep, was exactly abou him trying to take us on his side. Since his plan was always to enable this final shape where guardians clearly don't exist, why trying to bring us to his side? It is like he simply wants to make suffer the traveler by reclaming what he has already reclaimed, to show his power (?) and if he's not able to reclaim them, he makes them suffer. I don't if i was clear, this dude is twisted, jesus
Well, Guardians turning on the Traveler would also be turning on Humanity as a whole, which covers one point of driving hopelessness into Humanity. I also feel like the Witness *very* personally wanted our Guardian specifically because of how extraordinary we are, having been THE ones to kill Hive gods and more, that we probably would have been next in line to become its next Disciple or something similar. Even if stripped of the Light and replaced entirely with Darkness, our Guardian probably would've been one scary ass mofo. We probably would've filled the role that Calus did, except Calus was kind of a "settling for less" situation because there was nothing, no one like Nezarec or Rhulk anywhere in Sol. That's just my insight though
@@legenddarkrai yes, I think it also simply that the Witness hates us for what we have done to his disciples, we "slowed" his progression in some way, so yeah. I really like your point of view in the first sentence👍. I think that Bungie nailed the two main antagonists in the last two years (Savathun and The Witness), if they are very different, at the end of the day, the fact that they pushed us over the limits of what's good and what's bad...and made us discuss our bond with the Traveler is really fascinating. I would take these villains over Orix-like villains all day long.
The Witness likes causing despair and confusion, especially by brainwashing our own and making us fight amongst ourselves. The Young Wolf has become one of Humanity's greatest heroes, so if The Witness could successfully corrupt the chosen one into our very own Darth Vader, it would be tragic.
I wonder what the Witness thinks of the Speaker? If the Precursors wanted purpose and direction which they didn’t get from the Traveller, what does the Witness think of those that could hear it?
@@k9vendettathewolfofmordor529 I’m not sure, some people thinks so, but from what I know there is wiggle room in. What he says to Ghaul could be a lie to Ghaul or it could just mean the connection is one way. It could be like listing to a Radio or watching tv, the Traveler has things it wants people to understand/know so it talks, but it may not be aware of who, if anyone, can hear. So it talks, but is unable to hear.
Witness: Join me Guardian. I have the powers of the Light and the Dark. You have no chance. Guardian: Guardians make their own fate. It is YOU that no has chance.... transmat firing.
Also, The Guardian: It took me 10 years to understand what's going on and now I'm standing in front of it, I know what I must do.... *'GHOST, DROP THE VAULT!'* [The Witness is crushed underneath the weight of 500 weapons, Telesto laughs]
Honestly, I feel like her character is the only one of the good ones written from Lightfall. She should have been our Neomuna Vendor. It felt weird that Nimbus was our contact right at start outside the building, and the one messing with the Ishtar Collective Orbital Weapon Satellite instead of Quinn or one of the other people like Tse Jingye, or Viragni "Sid" D'Sydney (BUT NOT Sam Moleyn, he totally has like Sociopath vibes, with side of trying to slip something in my ether mug.). They should have also killed off Nimbus at the end of the Campaign, by Calus directly. Since after losing Rohan earlier in the campaign just to make the stakes feel like something without a defender, Neomuna would then depend on Guardians and Caiatl's forces (feels weird none of her forces stayed at the end to help keep the Shadow Legion in check) while waiting for new Cloudstriders made. And so we wouldn't have to suffer with his VO during Public Events sounding like some annoying teen sportscaster.
The Witness puts me to mind of a being similer to AM from "I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream" in the sense of hating us enough to view outright obliteration too good for us, and so prefers to make us suffer for as long as possible
The Witness - I have conquered your system and control everything you hold dear. The Guardian - You've gotten a lot farther than you should have, but then you haven't met me either. Your ride's over, mutie. Time to die.
Nezarec makes WAY more sense as a Disciple now. Their motivations seemed opposite, but the Witness being a cruel hypocrite actually aligns them. Nez is sent to torment those the Witness wants to suffer, that's why he's the favorite and has statues of himself aboard the Witness's personal Pyramid. The torment he brings to Light-touched races brings sadistic joy to the Witness. Rhulk is actually TOO efficient, and just wipes things out. The Ahslid failure was Rhulk failing at the Nezarec approach. Also, Nezarec seems to have been around for an even longer time than we thought, considering he was probably the Nightmare the last Noesis speaks of.
This kind of re frames the witnesses treatment of Rasputin to me. It was swift, immediate destruction. I thought it was because the witness considered rasputan a threat, but maybe the way rasputan distrusted / attacked the traveler made him less of an enemy to the witness, so it treated him with ‘mercy’.
And Savathunn basically ascended beyond everyone and tricked literally every cosmic force damn near. Shes truly an ultimately deadly enemy. I feel like her cunning and trickery with the experience of her past life as a light bearer now, we dont know what shes capable of. She had thos entire scenario set up from the tome we fought oryx... Her intelligence is of another kind. Shes truly terrifyin and im more qorried about her than the witness to be completely honest with you. Ots because of her we have been wrecking his disciples all over the solar system every time they show up. If not for her we would ahve lost a kong time ago. Its sort of poetic.
god damn byf I feel like you could get into voice acting with the amount of effort you put into these readings, I was genuinely surprised when I HEARD you on the edge of tears, the banging and the moving away from the mic really immersed me in the lore even more than I usually am, great stuff man!
It's very cute to see that seemingly everyone in the different factions as our allies in the light like and support Eido whereever they can. Just overall wholesome to see that she can enjoy this supportive and welcoming live.
I don’t know if this would count as a possible spoiler or not but I’ve been thinking it for a while that us Guardians are the final shape. What do you get when you combine Light and Darkness together? Us. You get us.
I agree wholeheartedly. An idea I had that makes it even funnier, The light uses Bomb Logic, The dark uses Sword Logic. What happens when you mix a bomb and a sword? Gun Logic.
The Final Shape, as defined by The Witness and its precursors has nothing directly to do with Light or Darkness though. They are only tools beeing used to achieve it. The precursors thought that the Final Shape was an Blissfull perfect endstate of the entire universe, where there only exists the absolute minimum of suffering, and the maximum of Happiness/ enlightenment, while the Witness simplified it to mean that nothing can happen or even exist without its will. i.e. the Final shape, no matter what definiton of it is used, is an worldstate, not an entity
@@Ryodren That or swords that create explosions when you swing them which sound pretty cool as a Guardian. Might need to get rezzed by our Ghost after every swing, but I Imagine it'll look cool. 🤣
@@Ryodrenthe only gun that I think could be the final shape is telesto, the amount of times that gun has crashed the universe would make the Witness jealous
More so than the emotionally motivated suffering it inflicts on anything related to the traveler, I think the witness sees the light as a blight, the crops it touches needing to be violently removed, lest they ruin the entire harvest. The record from the Noesis does not just show the witness trying to comfort the survivor and giving the civilisation a swift, surgical death. It also shows the witness trying to enact the final shape on them, something which may be unimaginably horrific to anything with a nervous system, but in the witness’ eyes, is an ultimate act of compassion, one which it has notably denied of the light-touched civilisations. If we aren’t erased from existence in the final shape, we will probably be kept completely separate from it in some endless torture dimension (perhaps the domain of Nezarec if the witness lets him hang around in the final shape). It’s really cool to see Venextron get a shoutout by the way!
I have to say, Byf, this was a masterpiece of a lore reading. The sound, the acting? Damn. The story of Exodus Yellow was such a pain. The Witness really wanted us to feel that suffering. With how it treated the Eliksni (and especially Eramis), you can just tell it feeds off torturing others.
Something that many characters in destiny seem to not realize is that the Traveler doesn't want to try and dictate a direction for life like the Precursors and the Witness. It provided opportunity and abundance which did leave a fair amount of opportunities for chaos. But the whole point was for societies to make their own choices.
If you think about it. The Witness and their idea of the final shape sounds kinda like Goku's reason to live. The Witness: "Woah! The guardians killed like 6 gods lol. They sound pretty strong!!!" (And that's how "The Final Shape" starts)
I really disagree with the notion that the witness hates us. Every time the witness has ever spoken to the player or any other character, it is in order to pry them away from the traveler. Besides those specific instances, we are disregarded entirely. The witness ultimately hates the traveler, and sees us and other civilizations touched by the light as victims. In the final witch queen cutscene, the witness speaks directly to the traveler and says as much. At the beginning of Lightfall, the witness itself completely ignores our forces to the point where it only looked our way to swat away the fireteam that got too close. Besides that specific part, the witness is staring down the traveler the whole time. I agree that the Witness is putting on a show, but it isn't for humanity. It isn't to make us feel hopeless. The witness doesn't care at all how humanity feels. The reason that the Witness induces so much suffering on light touched civilizations is to make the Traveler grieve. The Witness wants the Traveler to watch as everything it has created slowly turns on it and inevitably dies. That's my thoughts, anyway. Could be completely wrong.
I think you are right, but also wrong, because the answer seems to be simply both. The Witness is a gestalt being made of a legion of *mere mortals* -- people -- that were motivated by malice and grief. The Witness wants the Traveler to grieve, yes. But it also wants those touched by the Light to suffer, like Poseidon wanted Odysseus to suffer, for his insolence and hubris. It wants us to suffer its hatred for its deep personal satisfaction, as a being made of hateful mortals; it wants us to suffer because that suffering proves a point to The Traveler. It wants to show "Their suffering is just as much your fault as it is my fault. I could end them now, but I choose to show you their anguish, such is the chaos you've sown." And it would seem this is exactly why Nezarec, "The Final God of Pain", was a perfect fit for one of The Witness' many Disciples. I believe The Witness chooses to sow despair and confusion among the Light-touched in the same way the Joker likes to kill and torture the righteous, just to prove a point. It does this especially by brainwashing our own heroes and making us fight amongst ourselves. Receiving betrayal is a deep form of suffering. That's why it tries to pry the player away with talk of "Salvation" and coaxing with the addictive power of Stasis. We see this in the Dark Future timeline. The Young Wolf has become one of Humanity's greatest heroes, so if The Witness could successfully corrupt the "chosen one" into Destiny's very own Darth Vader, usurping the Vanguard and destroying us from within, it would be tragic. And it would prove The Witness' points.
We already had hints about this vefore from various sources, like when mara describes the vast hatred she felt from the witness when she brushed aginst its consciousness.
It's actually presented more as Consistency is inevitable vs I like change The winnower never realy claims the final shape to be its favorite thing merely something that it sees as inevitable
@@jimijenkins2548 Funny how u can comically reduce the darkness/winower to "biggest meta slave in existence" that got mad the light/gardener wanted to change up the meta lol
Entelechy, Eido: “Once, those who came before the Witness saw the Great Machine as hope for their future. As we did. As you do. They had hope once. They lost it. And now their successor, the great merging of their selves, the Witness, seeks to deny that hope any right to exist.” TFS gameplay trailer, unknown voice: “Take this power guardian. Be brave in dark places. For we are the light of hope.” I think I see the common thread here. Light and hope to the witness are one and the same. They hate the light because it gave them hope. For prosperity? Maybe. When it abandoned them after failing the union with the veil to make the final shape. That hope was lost. The traveler represents light just as much as hope to the witness, and the witness wants to make sure no other civilisation has hope ever again.
Fakers, god with imperfect is no god. God that can be compared to other is by no means Singular. But fakers create deceit, lowering the standard, warping your previous understanding. Makes it seem less.
I would also argue that the Guardian represents the opposite of the cycle of violence in Destiny’s world, that the Witness is part of. We see time and again figures like Oryx, Eramis, Rhulk, Savathun, Ghaul, and yes even the Witness, experience tragedy and suffering and go on to stand alone among their kind and try and forcibly shape the future for everyone - in the process inflicting the same suffering on others. The Guardian fits this same mold - going through and being shaped by tragedy - but they never try and follow that cycle. Despite the Witness trying to tempt us multiple times to go over fully we don’t. We don’t fit in with the Witness’s experiences or beliefs - and they hate that.
Thank you Byf! You always allow me to respect the writing of Bungie. Their lore is phenomenal! And your readings never fails to make it so much better!
I think an important clue is at the end of the witch queen. The witness says something about you've played all your cards to the traveler. Implying to me the the witness was basically like ok traveler you think you're right? show me.
The witness seeing a guardian rip the light out of a hive guardian and create a black hole with the energy; finally understanding the indominability of the human spirit and weeping to see the final shape of the universe it has created. Us.
Byf, I just wanted to say that your voice acting skills always really help bring these lore pieces to life. Your sense and portrayal of emotion in that last lore reading was fantastic and genuinely made me emotional. Absolutely love your content man, keep up the awesome work
commenting this early so maybe this will be mentioned ∩ is a math symbol! That is used in math for an intersection of sets/objects. A∩B represents only the elements / properties A and B share. I'm guessing that is it's use in the lore entry. Note: ∩ looks (somewhat) similar to the logical and operator (∧), which has a similar use to some extent, but is for logic statements and not sets/objects.
What I think is interesting is the hubris of it all. While civilisations that were never touched by the traveler seem to be just footnotes to the witness and more of a razing of weeds to get a uniform field, others like the elixni or humanity were targeted exterminations trying to inflict more despair onto those maybe as a show of force. However, even with all of that the civilisations that survived are the ones touched by the traveler. Even if their can largely be accredited to the Traveler, I'd like to think it's also the witnesse's emotionality involved. That would make it rather ironic.
The witness wants anything related to the traveler to suffer while anything having no idea of the traveler is treated as a mercy unaliving (censored for yt).
I'm so glad that Venextron's detective work on Unveiling has been recognized by the lore daddy, himself. If you haven't already, watch Venextron's video, "The Truth".
Dang Byf, your voice acting and sound effects were masterclass in this video! Really captured the fear, the pain, the hopelessness. Makes the lore much more visceral
I was a Destiny addict through about Forsaken and that had to stop for a few years - I've been binging your videos to catch up everything I've missed. Your videos are always absolutely exceptional, thank you!! Also have to say, while I appreciated the lore to enemies like Atheon, Crota, Oryx, Skolas ,etc - they weren't really that impressive looking - just bigger versions of the smaller serlves. The Witness is really striking in how fascinating, dark, creepy and uncanny valley he is- great stuff as usual, thank you!!!!
My god the voice acting of Byf in the dialogue of the entries… I am so proud of you for doing something I am studying to do with such joy and for yourself and your viewers. Keep up the good work!
The Witness sees us as The Traveler's final argument. It hates the Light and the chaos it causes. We are an insult to its perfection, and if we will not join it in the Final Shape, then we are the cause of suffering in its eyes. They give only two choices. Become a part of the Final Shape or die slowly and in agony
With the Witness and “Darkness” being freshed out more now, I can’t help but see a similarity to Spiral VS. Anti-Spiral from the anime Gurren Lagann. How Anti’s were scared of the destructive power of Spiral and did everything they could to suppress it. All it took was one person though to really make a stand against them and in turn brought more to our side.
If you think about it the use of Nezarec and Savathûn during the collapse by the Witness seems very deliberate now. Who better to bring on a campaign of suffering and torment than the eldritch god of fear and the Queen of deception and trickery.
I'm glad that Ada has gotten some more relevance and that at least a couple of weapons have returned with Into the Light, makes me hold on to that hope of the armory and forges being reignited once again!
when you were recording your footage Around 16:20 to16:23 You did an awesome clash With that tormentor fucking awesome action Movie scene moment there👍
Amazing voice acting performances from Byf in this video. The usage of foley and sound effects inparticular elevated the immersion to another level. Hope to see more readings like that in the future!
If the winnower ends up being the one to kill the species that became the witness it would be very satisfying to see... And right in a way you know? The final shape doesn't need to be forced eventually everything will end this universe is just one long game of life between the gardener and the winnower never needed to do anything but wait.. They never needed to force the final shape
The Witness: "If The Guardian has a million haters, I'm one of them. If he has one hater, it's me. If he has 0 haters, I have died. If the world is against The Guardian, I am with the world. If the world is for The Guardian, I am against the world."
The Witness wakes up EXTRA early to be a hater
literarly lol
The Witness is basically an entire race in one entity, so if the Guardian has a million haters they are probably all Witness’ alt accounts lmao
@@mystic3345The Witness be like, "You are what you eat," and eat a kilogram of materialized hatred and spite
"I wake up, I breath, I hate. You know who I really hate? Those god damn guardians"
Witness: join me Guardian, I’ll give you cool ice powers.
Guardian: nuh uh!
Witness: *fym nuh uh?!*
even gave us a pyramid ship on Europa, it responds to what we want it to do.
Had it offered us Resonance from the start things may have been different for many guardians.
The witness:yuh huh
Guardian: nuh huh
The witness: yuh huh!
I'm going to keep it a buck 50 with you dog we get an option at the end I'm choosing the witness
G: I'll take those ice powers
W: so your joining me
G:.....
W: your joining me right?
The Witness sees the species not touched by the Traveler as a simple harvest. But those that are, are an insult to the Final Shape. We defy the pattern and dare to offer a different truth. It's personal
We are also quite literally the child of the Traveler, the biggest enemy of the Witness. “The universe makes us all victim and perpetrator of its infinite cruelty”, but the Traveler more than any is the biggest protagonist of this suffering. We are the embodiment of the pain of the universe, the Witness hates not only us but also what we represent, everything the Witness wants to end basically.
He probably also really hates humanity now because they've interacted with both the Traveler and the Veil and aren't coming to the same conclusion as him.
Or, it could be that it’s not a truth at all in the first place. The closest thing we’d get would be a paradox
@@davida1229 To some entity that craves absolute order in the universe, an entity that "makes its own fate" is chaos incarnate, and anathème. By any means necessary, the Witness would see everything under the Traveler tormented before snuffing out that life, a most sadistic evil trifle. And that's if we, the Guardians, do not see the merit in their "final shape" and come to serve them to that end.
@@SelecaoOfMidasexactly in the unveiling the gardener was the entity that was upset with life game results and decided to alter the way it played without consulting with winnoer the ender the true final shape who accepts how the life game played. The Witness is causing the chaos the instability just like the gardener did. The guardian the winnoer unfortunately is to stop it. The Witness know all this and it is trying to prevent the guardian the winnoer from waking up to its strength by fair and cruel methods. Yet the winnoer/Guardian still stand
"Why do you think you can weild Light and Dark, while the rest of us are consigned to one?" - Savathûn. That question has been living rent-free in my head since I heard it, and I bet the Witness is wondering too...
The witness isn't wondering. He litteraly gave us stasis in hopes that we would join him
@Blackarot. yes, we were offered the darkness, but we twisted it for ourselves. No other being wields both, only one at a time. I'm sure the witness thought we'd take up the darkness and reject the light, killing our ghost to sever the connection.
@@ZhaloSupercell1It's more complicated than that
-“Fuck You, That’s Why.”
I mean keep in mind the Traveler is willingly giving us what the Witness wants. To wield light and dark at the same time. I feel like that just adds more that it's gonna hate us even more.
"We | the Noesis existed."
That line is terrifying. Imagine your entire species' existence, your history, your art, your influence on the world, completely and utterly erased in seconds. Imagine being scrubbed from footprint of the universe at the subatomic level such that the only proof you even existed was the lone record of a single person simply stating that you did.
Stellar writing by the lore team, as always.
I will always stan for the lore team. their ability to turn plotholes into plotpoints is second to NONE. This whole subject used to be a plothole: "why didn't the witness just kill us all in a second?" and then they made this banger.
The real life example is not far in the past. The third reich tried to inflict this terror on several people
It feels like they borrowed that line from Final Fantasy XIV, the last line of a villain. I won't say more than that, but it feels like a "Hey mind if I copy your homework". Not to say it's a bad line. It's definitely *COLD*.
Or Palestine. Gazans are saying similar stuff on their TikToks
what is it like being mentally handicapped
Oh, trust me. - the feeling is very mutual. Bastard stole my catalyst grind spot in the Whisper before it got overtaken by the darkness (i.e. sunset) before returning.
Well it’s back so
@@SypitzIt never should’ve left soooo……..
@@war.v27 I mean at the time it was for technical reasons. Not much one can do about that
We got Grasp of Avarice now though
@@zdude0127 Well that's wrong because when Bungie deleted content I paid for I returned the favor by not playing Destiny or any future Bungie product.
That transcript from the Arcadia jumpship pilot really shows why a being like Nezarec would ally with The Witness. While the swift eradication of entire species would appease a Disciple like Rhulk; these grand campaigns of hate and terror, the utter snuffing of the flames of hope under the suffocation of despair would have fed Nezarec like an all-you-can-eat buffet exclusively for him.
Also, the Bungie writers can really fucking cook with these lore entries. The words of that pilot made my stomach twist.
That is likely why Nezerec was the vanguard of the collapse (and likely the Whirlwind as well) it is his job to utterly _break_ those who the traveler has uplifted.
If the Witness wanted something done quick he sent Rhulk, if he wanted someone to suffer he sent Nezarec. We packed them both.
@@rampage0092 which probably makes him even more pissed.
@@bohba13 I’m sure, but it’s ok, we’re gonna pack him too
Not before we pack our own Ghost...after Lightfall...it feels like a liability more than an Ally...oh hell...Theory: Thats EXACTLY what we do...The time jumping we did with Osiris, the time we find OUR grave, how does a Guardian truly die again? They lose their Ghost and die one last time and weve seen just how easly our Ghost were taken over by the Witness...I think the Final Shape will be our Guardians final resting place because in the end we will have to destroy our Ghost or it sacrifices itself while it still has the capability to do so of its own accord to finish the Witness, and likely so deep within the realm the Witness creates, we dont escape.
Bro is really beefing with a 9 year old god killer. That’s crazy imo
Think it’s 10 now. The Guardian’s reached double digits!
@@jsmaster4779give it 5 months
Oh what the heck, I was thinking that today
Who would win:
A multi billion year old eldritch entity set on reducing the universe into its personal ideal vision
Some person who's practically a 9 year old given a few guns
@@jsmaster4779he’s a big boy now.
I totally forgot we are preteen guardians. Holy crap!
“I got cool powers to give right?”
“Right”
“So they are better than what the Traveler gave you”
“Makes sense”
“So you’ll join me cause I have more power”
“Guardians make their own fate”
Best I can do is 3 min cooldowns and spike grenades. 😂
Lmao
"So you'll join me cause I have more power?"
"Nah, you're just flavor of the month for us in terms of powers and we'll kill you because you'll make a cool gun."
@@Venteblack1HAHAGA
@@urazz7739imagine bro says if you side with me I’ll give you the raid exotic with no grinding.
It took merging an entire species to make the universes's biggest narcissist holy moly imagine causing the exact same pain and suffering that drives your hatred
You’d think in that whole species there’d be atleast one therapist but I guess not lmao
@@gagekellstrom3978To be fair, they were either "trimmed" off, coerced, or ran away PDQ before the "consensus" to create the Witness (RS).
@@SelecaoOfMidas exactly, it's not just a hivemind of people in their natural state, there are heavy implications that anything that wasn't final shape-related in the people that became the Witness was left out. Basically the Anti-Spiral from Guren Lagann
@@xXx_Regulus_xXx Holly Fug Thats it Witness IS GASH DARN IT ANTI-SPIRAL from Gurren Lagan!
@@xXx_Regulus_xXx what happened to what was "rejected" for lack of a better word
"In all my years of conquest, violence, slaughter, it was never personal. But I'll tell you now, what I'm about to do to your stubborn, annoying little [system]... I'm gonna enjoy it. Very, very much."
I would love it if we got the witness to swear
@@shrodingersgat2754 like if Zavala, Mara, or someone else was giving the witness a monologue and out of no where the witness spurts “BITCH you think I give a fuck?”
@@shrodingersgat2754I mean, the closest we got was the Witness literally screaming “ENOUGH!” at Calus cause he got sick of Calus’s shit. And then, of course, we got to see the Witness (or at least his Shadow) transform into something much bigger and much more frightening, enough to make Calus literally tear up in fear.
@twelved4983 actually, his nose bled. He wasn't teary: but he sure as hell was scared as fuck.
Why does this read like a Handsome Jack line from Borderlands 2?
Alright, seeing as none of yall have commented about this, can we all talk about Byf's editing? And his VOICE ACTING?? I mean, holy shit, the static added in while he reads the Grimoire, and his overall voice acting? Good Lord, it's gotten so good.
You have a really low bar for voice acting and editing that is "so good". His production value has increased since he started, but he's not a professional voice actor, and I'm pretty sure he hires editors
@MrNoble1997 it's good for a non professional, and someone passionate about their content, get off your high horse
@@MrNoble1997 I FOUND THE GUY WHO HATES GOOD THINGS
I'd say the voicing when the guy gets angry at the Traveler for not doing anything is where that shines. For a non-professional, that's some really voice acting.
@MrNoble1997 No one is paying him to put a little extra spice into his readings. He could have just read it in his normal voice, but he didn't. For me to do any level of voice acting would be massively stepping out of my comfort zone! He did a great job, and it sounded fantastic. He should be applauded for putting in the extra effort.
I feel sorry for you, that you can't see that. Maybe try pulling your head out of your own ass and appreciate the effort someone put into a free production for your benefit. Plus , it smells much nicer out here.
Odysseus: you are hated by god too?
Guardian: i took their stuff.
Odysseus: i killed the son of one of my gods and disgraced them
Guardian: ...i've done that too.
*both continue to get tormented by their respective gods wrath*
I am SO GLAD that I was not the only one who made this connection.
"For your arrogance, you will drift on my sea for an eternity; never again will you reach the shores of Ithaca. You will suffer. I want you to suffer much more."
Both the Eliksni and Humanity 'enjoyed' the benefits of the Traveler, BUT neither species did as the Precursors did (and both were never given the time to do so, by the Witness's attack) But whereas the Traveler left the Eliksni, and the survivors fled in pursuit. Humanity on the other hand were saved in the 1st attack by both the intervention of the Traveler, and the deception of Savathun. I believe the malice of the Witness is provoked by the idea that ANY species being co equal to the Precursors in receiving the Travelers 'Blessings'.
The Witness, by engaging in malice, by indulging in hatred has proven itself to be weak, and in this weakness to be less than the sum of it's parts.
The Witness is NOT the Winnower, merely a self indulgent weak facsimile. It will fail, and it will fall.
That's what I was thinking too, they're a bunch of space assholes compacted into one who couldn't fathom that destroying the universe and remaking it in their image would drive away the traveler.
I would love to see the guardian cuss them out mid monologue.
That's what I had in mind as well when we had the cutscene of the Witness absolutely losing their shit at Calus.
By indulging in it's wrath to the point it not only shouted at their subordinate, but quickly used fear and terror on him, it shatters any idea that the Witness was anywhere close to what the Winnower and Gardener are, it's no longer a "god" but a higher power of being that is so self indulgent in their goals.
Yeah because I was thinking this has to be out of jealousy or envy that the Traveler sees the Guardian or even Humanity as worthy as the Precursors felt when they first discovered it. Honestly you see how both civilizations find the Traveler in similar ways on a lone planet but for US it seemed like the Traveler WANTED us to notice it in our Solar system from how it deliberately avoided Earth until we became aware of its presence, like c’mon it knew we were there according to lore it seemed like it would get close to Earth and then go to another part of the system kinda like a pattern, the Witness found it half buried by coincidence… yes it blessed the Precursors with gifts too, out of maybe obligation from them helping it be freed, Whereas it looked to Humanity as its worthy saviors in its dying breath instead of fleeing as it did to the Witness.
That acting of the despairing survivor in his ship was incredible.
It felt incredibly sincere, moving away from the mic to mimic the frantic walking someone in such a state of mind would do....
That was one great scene, Byf, I'm very impressed!
If we ever get that destiny show, I'd like to see him get a role. Byf is a seriously good va
what does all this lore tell me about the Witness? The Witness needs a hug, a big hug, a paracausal hug...around the Throat.
And a galahorn rocket to the groin
I believe Eido is still missing a point here.
The Witness doesn‘t commit these atrocities because it hates everything the Traveller has touched. Rather I belive it commits to these acts as a demonstration to the Traveller that it‘s philosophy is wrong and only creates Chaos and Suffering. The Witness intends to grind the Traveller down, to hit it right in the spot where it hurts most: The Travellers love for the life it fostered.
It‘s a battle of philosphies neither can‘t back down from, lest they admit defeat. The Traveller HAS to move on to other systems and life-forms to prove its logic to the Witness. The Witness HAS to torture and decimate the life the Traveller touched to prove it‘s logic to the Witness. It‘s the Flower Game in it‘s sheer brutality.
But now things are different. The Traveller gave in and made it‘s Last Stand. The game is broken and the Witness in it‘s greatest hour of victory will soon realize, that a breaking of this cycle births new possibilities and other ways.
Yeah I see it way more like this than I do like the whole "jealous ex" thing people keep saying.
That’s a much more poetic perspective than ‘jealous ex’, much more interesting too
Humans have changed the game, The Witness had better pray we don't change it again
My favorite parts of Eido lore is when she goes off on a side tangent about human things. Like words she can’t pronounce or the waggling eyebrows. It’s really cute.
Someone should give her a round of applause or give her a huge hug for these results.
All the *[Redacted]* parts just after she gushes on Mara in another report especially get me. ^^
So glad to hear Venextron being mentioned. I happen to think he's absolutely nailed the Winnower and the Witness, and it sounds like Byf thinks so too
Yep. I knew this would be a part of the video before even listening. Great setup
Venextron knows the original story
@@Ben-zg8xk him and Myrzir, definitely give his channel a look too
Yeah, his analysis was absolutely what helped spur me to my final thoughts on the Winnower vs Witness question. I'm so glad he jumped in and took a big look at it because his thoughts are such a great reinforcement to my own understanding of things...
AAAHHHHH.,..... VENEXETRON.... MY FAVORITE! VERY GLAD.. (NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH GLADD UA-camR HAHA LOL) THEIR UA-cam CHANELL GOT MENTIONED HERE... TWO LORE PEOPLE MERGING INTO ONE! HUZZAH!
I hope we get to see the Witness in the final shape get extremely emotional. Like I mean... blood boiling, screaming, yelling, that type of thing.
That'd be awesome
Listen to the end of the new trailer, sound like the witness was yelling
@@kingrushy4533 I saw, I smiled when it happened :)
To that I say, "Cope, seethe, and witness these nuts."
Absolutely perfect response
Even better : Badger's "Cope Seethe" clip
In fact -- once Contest Mode is off, Im gonna try and complete the Raid and standing in front of banner placement of Final Encounter - blare that video into in-game VC off my phone 100% Volume
In the 3rd account, it mentioned something about a sickly green light, I find it interesting and relate it to savathun and the accounts we know she had during the collapse, there’s another piece of lore saying that savathun reach out to a simple human family before the arrival of the traveller, telling them to sing a song and unknowingly create a hive spell that would somehow ensure humanities survival and the creation of the last city, and of course we know she killed nezarec, caused his ship to crash into the moon and stole the veil.
It’s my personal head canon that the this sickly green light was this spell that the family was creating over time until the collapse, and that this spell trapped the traveller on earth, effectively cornering it to fight back.
The great Gatsby reference
I'm actually really glad that the Witness was written this way; as an all powerful entity, ultimately full of hypocrisy as it chases the thing it loves to hate across the universe. It's like a jealous ex boyfriend unable to accept the fact that she's moved on, and furiously insisting that only he can truly fix her. Meanwhile we're the Traveller's new side piece, and that's painted a massive target on our backs. It makes the fight a whole lot more personal, instead of just us fighting an abstract entity devoid of character.
On the contrary, that really cuts down on the complexity and impressiveness and scale of a story of primordial forces being bent by an ancient eldritch being's will. The simplification of this conflict just shows how out of their depth Bungie's current writers are in grand, sweeping space epics - they have to reduce a nigh-godlike ancient entity down into to the equivalent of a jealous ex on a rampage, rather than attempting to go anywhere alien and hard to conceptualize but display it understandably for others.
It's also why the Vex have been sidelined so hard, because with the current established Vex lore they fall perfectly into something so foreign and alien to us that trying to write for them is difficult if you can't warp your mind to view things from a perspective close to theirs.
I don't blame the writers for these. It's a tough task, and not everyone can incorporate extremely difficult and foreign concepts into their writing.
@@trashjashfor sure but maybe there’s more to come out of the Witness. We heard “voices” in Shadowkeep and Beyond Light that wanted to give us Darkness, even saying it was thanks for enduring for so long under the Light.
It was as if they viewed us as kindred spirits, and we know not everyone who makes up the Witness had the same ideas.
We might see more varied opinions from the Pyramids or even the Darkness itself
Tbf the traveller has just dipped at 2 other species instead of helping them and correct me if I’m wrong rasputin crippled the traveller to stop it from leaving us too
I've been saying over the years, that the Darkness (later, the Witness) was starting to sound more and more like a jilted Ex. Been saying that since Beyond Light.
This lore is only reinforcing that belief.
@@empiyrr2133 Rasputin activated neither the Abhorrent Imperative nor the Loki Crown protocols. They were possibilities during the Collapse, but they were not used. The Traveler chose to stay
Couple of things... Cayde 6 being killed seems less and less like a random story event and more a machination of the witness to inflict us pain. He was just about the only character left with actual memories of the collapse with a close personal tie to us.
On the subject of the Pyramids being invincible to ordinary (causal) beings and weapos.. this is precisely why the Traveler made ghosts and guardians. It knew that to take his nemesis down he needed paracausal entities....fast forward to season of defiance and we are now able to pass through said invincible ships by dipping in and out of the ascendant plane which sounds an awful lot like the pocket dimension talked about where the bullets get lost to.
After all, during Shadowkeep the Witness specifically mocks the death of Cayde to show how weak the light is. Even if it was a random event, the Witness definitely took advantage of it.
That's a good shout. The ascendant plane being used as the pyramids defense barrier
Why does the Witness hate us? Oh that’s obvious, we creased their Jays
The audacity
And just you wait. Ill crease every single jay in his collection for the shit he started and has done
NOT THE JAYSS!?
How ghastly!
Oh my
I guess that's why the Witness' faction is called "The Dread"
Well, I guess Osiris finally has his answer as to why the Witness let us live. Though, while he’ll probably be greatful to Eido for her findings, probably say something like, “To defeat thy enemy, we must know thy enemy”, he’ll probably be terrified hearing this truth: that the Witness let us live not because the Traveler was it’s primary target, or that we were to weak to bother fighting. But rather, to prolong our suffering to do the most amount of physical, emotional, and psychological pain. Because it hates us.
TRUE! THANK YOU.
“Why should a god care about a mortal?”
Straight up thought Byf was referencing the Guardian from the jump.
Why does God need a Starship?
@@stormsurge2103 so they don’t make the mortals/non gods jealous or suspicious
Wait, I thought the only reason we are chasing the Witness into the Traveller was to shave their uni-brow. I don't care what they do to make the final shape happen, as long as they look good while doing it
Witness: "The unibrow stays."
Us: *"So you have chosen death."*
oh god now I have the mental image of a titan leaping at the witness thundercrash-style with a razor clenched in his fist and shaving cream in the other, aiming for that unibrow
@@thorveim1174 we should get chat gpt or some ai to generate that photo
Brother, that uni is fabulous. What are you on about? 🤣
@@thorveim1174 Hunters get the Spectral single blade razor and Warlocks got the Follicle Bomb after shave. Let's get it, Guardians. 😅
Only at the 1:28 mark and I swear if I hear something along the lines of “The indomitable human spirit” I’m both going to lose it and die laughing
I can just imagine The Witness losing it's mind during the raid. The audacity of the filth of the gardener to harm it
We definetly need to see cutscene where Witness is making ''I am inevitable and final shape is here'' speech, and our Guardian shoot Witness wounding it and that makes it loose its dam cool so dam much that it rages on how we dare damage a god.
Im assuming the Witness saw all the Megamind memes we made of him..... he did not find them amusing sadly
When Eido says "the witness wants to ruin everything the Traveler has touched" is very interesting...I wonder if that's why the first contact we had with the black fleet ,back in shadowkeep, was exactly abou him trying to take us on his side. Since his plan was always to enable this final shape where guardians clearly don't exist, why trying to bring us to his side? It is like he simply wants to make suffer the traveler by reclaming what he has already reclaimed, to show his power (?) and if he's not able to reclaim them, he makes them suffer. I don't if i was clear, this dude is twisted, jesus
It wanted to ruin us make us a desiple and break both humantiy and the traveler spirit it wanted to make us the ermis of humantiy
Well, Guardians turning on the Traveler would also be turning on Humanity as a whole, which covers one point of driving hopelessness into Humanity. I also feel like the Witness *very* personally wanted our Guardian specifically because of how extraordinary we are, having been THE ones to kill Hive gods and more, that we probably would have been next in line to become its next Disciple or something similar. Even if stripped of the Light and replaced entirely with Darkness, our Guardian probably would've been one scary ass mofo. We probably would've filled the role that Calus did, except Calus was kind of a "settling for less" situation because there was nothing, no one like Nezarec or Rhulk anywhere in Sol. That's just my insight though
@@legenddarkrai yes, I think it also simply that the Witness hates us for what we have done to his disciples, we "slowed" his progression in some way, so yeah. I really like your point of view in the first sentence👍. I think that Bungie nailed the two main antagonists in the last two years (Savathun and The Witness), if they are very different, at the end of the day, the fact that they pushed us over the limits of what's good and what's bad...and made us discuss our bond with the Traveler is really fascinating. I would take these villains over Orix-like villains all day long.
The Witness likes causing despair and confusion, especially by brainwashing our own and making us fight amongst ourselves. The Young Wolf has become one of Humanity's greatest heroes, so if The Witness could successfully corrupt the chosen one into our very own Darth Vader, it would be tragic.
I wonder what the Witness thinks of the Speaker? If the Precursors wanted purpose and direction which they didn’t get from the Traveller, what does the Witness think of those that could hear it?
Wasn't the speaker bullshitting?
@@k9vendettathewolfofmordor529The last one was confirmed to be. Others would be possible, but unconfirmed.
@@k9vendettathewolfofmordor529
I’m not sure, some people thinks so, but from what I know there is wiggle room in.
What he says to Ghaul could be a lie to Ghaul or it could just mean the connection is one way. It could be like listing to a Radio or watching tv, the Traveler has things it wants people to understand/know so it talks, but it may not be aware of who, if anyone, can hear. So it talks, but is unable to hear.
@@k9vendettathewolfofmordor529not really. As he said to ghaul “I said I speak for the traveler. I never said it spoke to me”
Witness: Join me Guardian. I have the powers of the Light and the Dark. You have no chance.
Guardian: Guardians make their own fate. It is YOU that no has chance.... transmat firing.
Also, The Guardian: It took me 10 years to understand what's going on and now I'm standing in front of it, I know what I must do....
*'GHOST, DROP THE VAULT!'*
[The Witness is crushed underneath the weight of 500 weapons, Telesto laughs]
[Telesto Laughs]
Chilling.
and then your transmat actually goes wrong and all you hear when arriving is.... hive bring a sword
We are the Final Shape. The Witness is going to find out.
damn, even in lore books Quinn is trying to flirt with us
My character is a deaf exo, if she wants to make a move on him she needs holoprojectors and maybe a parade or he won't get it.
@@nerag7459 Well that's one creative way to canonize subtitles!
@@legenddarkrai I play at night with the sound off so as not to wake my kids. I missed the whole 'song of savathuun' development because of this.
@@nerag7459 headphones are a thing
Honestly, I feel like her character is the only one of the good ones written from Lightfall. She should have been our Neomuna Vendor. It felt weird that Nimbus was our contact right at start outside the building, and the one messing with the Ishtar Collective Orbital Weapon Satellite instead of Quinn or one of the other people like Tse Jingye, or Viragni "Sid" D'Sydney (BUT NOT Sam Moleyn, he totally has like Sociopath vibes, with side of trying to slip something in my ether mug.).
They should have also killed off Nimbus at the end of the Campaign, by Calus directly. Since after losing Rohan earlier in the campaign just to make the stakes feel like something without a defender, Neomuna would then depend on Guardians and Caiatl's forces (feels weird none of her forces stayed at the end to help keep the Shadow Legion in check) while waiting for new Cloudstriders made. And so we wouldn't have to suffer with his VO during Public Events sounding like some annoying teen sportscaster.
The Witness puts me to mind of a being similer to AM from "I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream" in the sense of hating us enough to view outright obliteration too good for us, and so prefers to make us suffer for as long as possible
The Witness - I have conquered your system and control everything you hold dear.
The Guardian - You've gotten a lot farther than you should have, but then you haven't met me either. Your ride's over, mutie. Time to die.
Is that a frank horrigan quote?
@@brenttrent8811 it is indeed !
Based reference
The punch at 16:20 was just cinematic
Was looking for someone else who saw that.
ERM... THAT WAS R/AWESOME IF I'VE EVER SEEN SUCH AN AMAZING DISPLAY OF AWESOME BEFORE...
That initial image of the witness staring at us makes this video feel so cursed lol.
It is gently stroking the uncanny valley, just looking at it terrify me, I haven't played since it was introduced
Nezarec makes WAY more sense as a Disciple now. Their motivations seemed opposite, but the Witness being a cruel hypocrite actually aligns them. Nez is sent to torment those the Witness wants to suffer, that's why he's the favorite and has statues of himself aboard the Witness's personal Pyramid. The torment he brings to Light-touched races brings sadistic joy to the Witness. Rhulk is actually TOO efficient, and just wipes things out. The Ahslid failure was Rhulk failing at the Nezarec approach.
Also, Nezarec seems to have been around for an even longer time than we thought, considering he was probably the Nightmare the last Noesis speaks of.
hearing how the Witness "Finallized" that race is giving me MAJOR vibes of the new race being just those beings lead like the taken against us.
Oh lord bro not the weird witness rizz stare 😭😭
👁️ 👁️
This kind of re frames the witnesses treatment of Rasputin to me. It was swift, immediate destruction. I thought it was because the witness considered rasputan a threat, but maybe the way rasputan distrusted / attacked the traveler made him less of an enemy to the witness, so it treated him with ‘mercy’.
And Savathunn basically ascended beyond everyone and tricked literally every cosmic force damn near. Shes truly an ultimately deadly enemy. I feel like her cunning and trickery with the experience of her past life as a light bearer now, we dont know what shes capable of. She had thos entire scenario set up from the tome we fought oryx... Her intelligence is of another kind. Shes truly terrifyin and im more qorried about her than the witness to be completely honest with you. Ots because of her we have been wrecking his disciples all over the solar system every time they show up. If not for her we would ahve lost a kong time ago. Its sort of poetic.
Witness bout to drop a Disstrack on the Guardian 🔥
Swag messiah 🔥
Best reply so far lol!
That be the raid soundtrack😂
Rhulk and Nezarec already did that, so...
@dropkick3024 The raid soundtrack being all Witnesses' SoundCloud raps would be hilarious!
god damn byf I feel like you could get into voice acting with the amount of effort you put into these readings, I was genuinely surprised when I HEARD you on the edge of tears, the banging and the moving away from the mic really immersed me in the lore even more than I usually am, great stuff man!
How ironic. The witness claims it wishes to end suffering. And yet it was born from a desire to cause suffering.
It's very cute to see that seemingly everyone in the different factions as our allies in the light like and support Eido whereever they can.
Just overall wholesome to see that she can enjoy this supportive and welcoming live.
I don’t know if this would count as a possible spoiler or not but I’ve been thinking it for a while that us Guardians are the final shape. What do you get when you combine Light and Darkness together? Us. You get us.
I agree wholeheartedly. An idea I had that makes it even funnier, The light uses Bomb Logic, The dark uses Sword Logic. What happens when you mix a bomb and a sword?
Gun Logic.
The Final Shape, as defined by The Witness and its precursors has nothing directly to do with Light or Darkness though. They are only tools beeing used to achieve it. The precursors thought that the Final Shape was an Blissfull perfect endstate of the entire universe, where there only exists the absolute minimum of suffering, and the maximum of Happiness/ enlightenment, while the Witness simplified it to mean that nothing can happen or even exist without its will. i.e. the Final shape, no matter what definiton of it is used, is an worldstate, not an entity
@@centimanj8916 fair enough, I just thought it’d be cool if the Guardians were the final shape. It seems like it’d be fitting.
@@Ryodren That or swords that create explosions when you swing them which sound pretty cool as a Guardian. Might need to get rezzed by our Ghost after every swing, but I Imagine it'll look cool. 🤣
@@Ryodrenthe only gun that I think could be the final shape is telesto, the amount of times that gun has crashed the universe would make the Witness jealous
More so than the emotionally motivated suffering it inflicts on anything related to the traveler, I think the witness sees the light as a blight, the crops it touches needing to be violently removed, lest they ruin the entire harvest. The record from the Noesis does not just show the witness trying to comfort the survivor and giving the civilisation a swift, surgical death. It also shows the witness trying to enact the final shape on them, something which may be unimaginably horrific to anything with a nervous system, but in the witness’ eyes, is an ultimate act of compassion, one which it has notably denied of the light-touched civilisations. If we aren’t erased from existence in the final shape, we will probably be kept completely separate from it in some endless torture dimension (perhaps the domain of Nezarec if the witness lets him hang around in the final shape).
It’s really cool to see Venextron get a shoutout by the way!
Can we all just take a minute to appreciate Byf’s voice acting? Like omg 11/10 work
Seeing Byfs progress as a narrator/voice actor over the year is amazing. Seriously quality audio work on this one!
Always love more Witness content
Spectacular VA work in this video Byf, you could really FEEL the characters desperation in your voice during 39:52
50 mins of byf, here we go
Probably tried to go flawless in Trials of Osiris with a random stack. So completely understandable
I have to say, Byf, this was a masterpiece of a lore reading. The sound, the acting? Damn. The story of Exodus Yellow was such a pain. The Witness really wanted us to feel that suffering. With how it treated the Eliksni (and especially Eramis), you can just tell it feeds off torturing others.
16:20 That clash between the titan and the tormentor was awesome
Titan is everybit the brute and powerhouse as a tormemter in hand to hand
Something that many characters in destiny seem to not realize is that the Traveler doesn't want to try and dictate a direction for life like the Precursors and the Witness. It provided opportunity and abundance which did leave a fair amount of opportunities for chaos. But the whole point was for societies to make their own choices.
If you think about it. The Witness and their idea of the final shape sounds kinda like Goku's reason to live.
The Witness: "Woah! The guardians killed like 6 gods lol. They sound pretty strong!!!"
(And that's how "The Final Shape" starts)
All the world a stage. Humanity, simply props. The traveler, his audience. The show, a big, fat middle finger.
I really disagree with the notion that the witness hates us. Every time the witness has ever spoken to the player or any other character, it is in order to pry them away from the traveler. Besides those specific instances, we are disregarded entirely. The witness ultimately hates the traveler, and sees us and other civilizations touched by the light as victims. In the final witch queen cutscene, the witness speaks directly to the traveler and says as much. At the beginning of Lightfall, the witness itself completely ignores our forces to the point where it only looked our way to swat away the fireteam that got too close. Besides that specific part, the witness is staring down the traveler the whole time. I agree that the Witness is putting on a show, but it isn't for humanity. It isn't to make us feel hopeless. The witness doesn't care at all how humanity feels. The reason that the Witness induces so much suffering on light touched civilizations is to make the Traveler grieve. The Witness wants the Traveler to watch as everything it has created slowly turns on it and inevitably dies. That's my thoughts, anyway. Could be completely wrong.
I think you are right, but also wrong, because the answer seems to be simply both.
The Witness is a gestalt being made of a legion of *mere mortals* -- people -- that were motivated by malice and grief.
The Witness wants the Traveler to grieve, yes. But it also wants those touched by the Light to suffer, like Poseidon wanted Odysseus to suffer, for his insolence and hubris.
It wants us to suffer its hatred for its deep personal satisfaction, as a being made of hateful mortals; it wants us to suffer because that suffering proves a point to The Traveler.
It wants to show "Their suffering is just as much your fault as it is my fault. I could end them now, but I choose to show you their anguish, such is the chaos you've sown."
And it would seem this is exactly why Nezarec, "The Final God of Pain", was a perfect fit for one of The Witness' many Disciples.
I believe The Witness chooses to sow despair and confusion among the Light-touched in the same way the Joker likes to kill and torture the righteous, just to prove a point. It does this especially by brainwashing our own heroes and making us fight amongst ourselves. Receiving betrayal is a deep form of suffering. That's why it tries to pry the player away with talk of "Salvation" and coaxing with the addictive power of Stasis. We see this in the Dark Future timeline. The Young Wolf has become one of Humanity's greatest heroes, so if The Witness could successfully corrupt the "chosen one" into Destiny's very own Darth Vader, usurping the Vanguard and destroying us from within, it would be tragic. And it would prove The Witness' points.
We already had hints about this vefore from various sources, like when mara describes the vast hatred she felt from the witness when she brushed aginst its consciousness.
I just imagine the witness having a whole low tier god speech when the guardian doesnt join them
Bro they had me on dish duty at work and this video helped get through it thank you so much plus top tier voice acting.
The Gardner: change is inevitable and necessary.
The Winnower: I like consistency.
It's actually presented more as
Consistency is inevitable vs I like change
The winnower never realy claims the final shape to be its favorite thing merely something that it sees as inevitable
@@gamerskingdom4897 You don't spend three whole grimoire cards waxing poetic about something you don't love. Bro is infatuated with his final shape.
@@jimijenkins2548 If the final shape is the most meta thing in existence that means the darkness/winnower/witness is the biggest meta slave there is
@@thedoomslayer5863 Not so much the Witness, but your point stands. The Winnower loooves the meta.
@@jimijenkins2548 Funny how u can comically reduce the darkness/winower to "biggest meta slave in existence" that got mad the light/gardener wanted to change up the meta lol
Entelechy, Eido: “Once, those who came before the Witness saw the Great Machine as hope for their future. As we did. As you do. They had hope once. They lost it. And now their successor, the great merging of their selves, the Witness, seeks to deny that hope any right to exist.”
TFS gameplay trailer, unknown voice: “Take this power guardian. Be brave in dark places. For we are the light of hope.”
I think I see the common thread here. Light and hope to the witness are one and the same. They hate the light because it gave them hope. For prosperity? Maybe. When it abandoned them after failing the union with the veil to make the final shape. That hope was lost. The traveler represents light just as much as hope to the witness, and the witness wants to make sure no other civilisation has hope ever again.
Gods aren't supposed to be capable of hubris and yet we may be witnessing (heh) exactly that.
Fakers, god with imperfect is no god. God that can be compared to other is by no means Singular. But fakers create deceit, lowering the standard, warping your previous understanding. Makes it seem less.
Witness sees people living under a big pearl: "...And I took that personally".
Random Thought - I find it pretty amusing that the most notable Lore Scribe in the Destiny Community is a Titan, and not a Warlock.
He was a warlock. I think he just started playing Titan for a charity goal or something of the sort
I would also argue that the Guardian represents the opposite of the cycle of violence in Destiny’s world, that the Witness is part of.
We see time and again figures like Oryx, Eramis, Rhulk, Savathun, Ghaul, and yes even the Witness, experience tragedy and suffering and go on to stand alone among their kind and try and forcibly shape the future for everyone - in the process inflicting the same suffering on others.
The Guardian fits this same mold - going through and being shaped by tragedy - but they never try and follow that cycle. Despite the Witness trying to tempt us multiple times to go over fully we don’t. We don’t fit in with the Witness’s experiences or beliefs - and they hate that.
I think were gonna need help from the big guns in defeating The Witness....*in aztecross yelling voice* RANDAAAAAAAL THE VANDAAAAAAAAL
Thank you Byf! You always allow me to respect the writing of Bungie. Their lore is phenomenal! And your readings never fails to make it so much better!
Witness is going to regret not ending Sol quick enough.
I think an important clue is at the end of the witch queen.
The witness says something about you've played all your cards to the traveler.
Implying to me the the witness was basically like ok traveler you think you're right? show me.
The witness seeing a guardian rip the light out of a hive guardian and create a black hole with the energy; finally understanding the indominability of the human spirit and weeping to see the final shape of the universe it has created. Us.
No wonder they tried to recruit us first under the guise of it being "our salvation". Now it's gloves off time.
Byf, I just wanted to say that your voice acting skills always really help bring these lore pieces to life. Your sense and portrayal of emotion in that last lore reading was fantastic and genuinely made me emotional. Absolutely love your content man, keep up the awesome work
commenting this early so maybe this will be mentioned
∩ is a math symbol! That is used in math for an intersection of sets/objects. A∩B represents only the elements / properties A and B share. I'm guessing that is it's use in the lore entry.
Note: ∩ looks (somewhat) similar to the logical and operator (∧), which has a similar use to some extent, but is for logic statements and not sets/objects.
What I think is interesting is the hubris of it all.
While civilisations that were never touched by the traveler seem to be just footnotes to the witness and more of a razing of weeds to get a uniform field, others like the elixni or humanity were targeted exterminations trying to inflict more despair onto those maybe as a show of force.
However, even with all of that the civilisations that survived are the ones touched by the traveler.
Even if their can largely be accredited to the Traveler, I'd like to think it's also the witnesse's emotionality involved.
That would make it rather ironic.
The witness wants anything related to the traveler to suffer while anything having no idea of the traveler is treated as a mercy unaliving (censored for yt).
Byf, I’m loving the recent love you’ve given to the reading. It’s audiobook quality and it’s fantastic.
I'm so glad that Venextron's detective work on Unveiling has been recognized by the lore daddy, himself. If you haven't already, watch Venextron's video, "The Truth".
Dang Byf, your voice acting and sound effects were masterclass in this video! Really captured the fear, the pain, the hopelessness. Makes the lore much more visceral
I see why Byf earned the title: Lore Daddy.
✨"!!HE IS GOOD!!"✨
I was a Destiny addict through about Forsaken and that had to stop for a few years - I've been binging your videos to catch up everything I've missed. Your videos are always absolutely exceptional, thank you!! Also have to say, while I appreciated the lore to enemies like Atheon, Crota, Oryx, Skolas ,etc - they weren't really that impressive looking - just bigger versions of the smaller serlves. The Witness is really striking in how fascinating, dark, creepy and uncanny valley he is- great stuff as usual, thank you!!!!
Yoo was the Noesis visited by Nezerac first before the Witness? At 5:25 doesn’t it sound kinda like the Noesis might have been visited by Nezerac?
My god the voice acting of Byf in the dialogue of the entries…
I am so proud of you for doing something I am studying to do with such joy and for yourself and your viewers. Keep up the good work!
The Witness sees us as The Traveler's final argument. It hates the Light and the chaos it causes. We are an insult to its perfection, and if we will not join it in the Final Shape, then we are the cause of suffering in its eyes. They give only two choices. Become a part of the Final Shape or die slowly and in agony
With the Witness and “Darkness” being freshed out more now, I can’t help but see a similarity to Spiral VS. Anti-Spiral from the anime Gurren Lagann. How Anti’s were scared of the destructive power of Spiral and did everything they could to suppress it. All it took was one person though to really make a stand against them and in turn brought more to our side.
unpopular theory: the noesis where "finalized" into the new dread enemies coming in final shape.
If you think about it the use of Nezarec and Savathûn during the collapse by the Witness seems very deliberate now. Who better to bring on a campaign of suffering and torment than the eldritch god of fear and the Queen of deception and trickery.
I'm glad that Ada has gotten some more relevance and that at least a couple of weapons have returned with Into the Light, makes me hold on to that hope of the armory and forges being reignited once again!
Damn, Byf really giving it his acting chops with some of these. Appropriately captured the desperate fear in the Collapse. Well done my friend.
when you were recording your footage Around 16:20 to16:23 You did an awesome clash With that tormentor fucking awesome action Movie scene moment there👍
That was some anime crap lmao
That intro was fire, perfect delivery. Blunt, factual, inarguably true. You always do such an awesome job Byf. Thank you for all your work.
I think the Witness'' theatrics weren't just for those blessed by the traveler, But the Traveler Herself...
Amazing voice acting performances from Byf in this video. The usage of foley and sound effects inparticular elevated the immersion to another level. Hope to see more readings like that in the future!
I still think the Witness sees itself as the knife of the Winnower
The Witness may actually (incorrectly) think of itself as the Winnower, when in reality it is simply the knife.
If the winnower ends up being the one to kill the species that became the witness it would be very satisfying to see... And right in a way you know? The final shape doesn't need to be forced eventually everything will end this universe is just one long game of life between the gardener and the winnower never needed to do anything but wait.. They never needed to force the final shape