The tracking module? how does it get there?

[Black Hayate]

Hello everyone!

I recently finished this great game (excluding the dlc that I'm saving for later).
I pretty much understood the whole story, but there's still one thing I can't explain: how does the tracking module end up at the heart of Giant's Deep?
I don't think that the explosion of the orbital station alone was enough to send it in there (given the difficulty of getting through with the red jellyfish),

does anyone know this information? (I'd be very grateful 😀)

[Perseus]

It probably fell into a tornado to get past the current, and i think it just fell through the electric barrier?

[Sammun Mak]

Originally posted by Perseus:

It probably fell into a tornado to get past the current, and i think it just fell through the electric barrier?

Bingo. It's been a while, but I seem to recall a note about "How the hell did something get below the surface?" too of which the solution was the tornado.

[Goblin]

The core of GD repels your ship because it's made of metal, and conducts electricity. The jellyfish show that anything that's insulated can pass right through. Nomai build out of rock, and their machinery does not use electricity but some other form of energy they can see with their third eye. So as long as it just happened to hit the right tornado, the tracking module was free to just pass down all the way.

[Perseus]

Originally posted by Goblin:

and their machinery does not use electricity but some other form of energy they can see with their third eye.

Where is your source? The only reference to Nomai seeing stuff with their third eye that i know of implies nothing of the sort.

[Black Hayate]

Originally posted by Perseus:

Originally posted by Goblin:

and their machinery does not use electricity but some other form of energy they can see with their third eye.

Where is your source? The only reference to Nomai seeing stuff with their third eye that i know of implies nothing of the sort.

Thank you for your initial feedback, it's very interesting.
Interesting question about electricity, I'd be interested in an answer too.
So we're working on the assumption that at the beginning of the loop, the orbital station explodes (we're sure of that) and sends the tracking module to the centre of Giant's Deep via the only tornado on the surface which sends it in the direction of the core (there too and not to the centre of the core).
That's quite a stroke of luck, isn't it? (I know I'm looking for details but I'm trying to understand how the developers came up with this particular sequence)
What's more, each loop sends the probe to a different location, which certainly has an impact on the explosion and therefore how the exploded tracking module separates from the station.

[Vanilla Fish]

Originally posted by Black Hayate:

That's quite a stroke of luck, isn't it? (I know I'm looking for details but I'm trying to understand how the developers came up with this particular sequence)
What's more, each loop sends the probe to a different location, which certainly has an impact on the explosion and therefore how the exploded tracking module separates from the station.

I believe the tracking module was sucked to the core during construction (when they were using the tornados to move parts up to the canon to put together) and they never got around to retrieving it or constructing a new one before the project was put on hold and the rest of their history unfolds.

[Perseus]

Originally posted by Vanilla Fish:

I believe the tracking module was sucked to the core during construction (when they were using the tornados to move parts up to the canon to put together) and they never got around to retrieving it or constructing a new one before the project was put on hold and the rest of their history unfolds.

Everything aboard the Orbital Probe Cannon and the Probe Tracking Module says the opposite, including the fact that the pathway to where the Probe Tracking Module should be is broken, as opposed to incomplete or sealed off.
They also installed a statue aboard, which they had no reason to do before launching the component into orbit, and the Control Module also shows an animation of the Tracking Module going missing.

Originally posted by Black Hayate:

That's quite a stroke of luck, isn't it? (I know I'm looking for details but I'm trying to understand how the developers came up with this particular sequence)
What's more, each loop sends the probe to a different location, which certainly has an impact on the explosion and therefore how the exploded tracking module separates from the station.

That's true, i realized this a while after posting but forgot to come back to mention it. Not sure how to explain that part, since at least some cannon alignments should have the Tracking Module facing away from the planet, which would change its impact point drastically.

[Vanilla Fish]

Originally posted by Perseus:

It's open to space - not necessarily broken like the path to 2. There wouldn't be a pressing reason to seal it up if they intended to eventually hook a module up there before the project was cancelled and, as you admit, the shifting alignment of the station would make the module clipping the correct tornado and slipping snuggly into the coral at the core preeetty inconsistent.

Why wouldn't they have installed the statue and all other components before launching it off planet? It still functions for us perfectly fine with their tech, regardless of if it snapped off when the cannon blew and managed to avoid any sort of serious damage like module 2 or if it sunk and was left there. At least to me, it makes sense they'd finish construction in the construction yard and not worry about launching scraps up to be installed in space.

[Perseus]

Originally posted by Vanilla Fish:

Originally posted by Perseus:

It's open to space - not necessarily broken like the path to 2. There wouldn't be a pressing reason to seal it up if they intended to eventually hook a module up there before the project was cancelled and, as you admit, the shifting alignment of the station would make the module clipping the correct tornado and slipping snuggly into the coral at the core preeetty inconsistent.

Why wouldn't they have installed the statue and all other components before launching it off planet? It still functions for us perfectly fine with their tech, regardless of if it snapped off when the cannon blew and managed to avoid any sort of serious damage like module 2 or if it sunk and was left there. At least to me, it makes sense they'd finish construction in the construction yard and not worry about launching scraps up to be installed in space.

It makes more sense to me to complete the cannon in space, in case something went wrong (they were using tornadoes after all, and something did go wrong).
Here's some other counterproofs :

-There's been communications between modules after they were sent to space, as can be seen by using the corresponding projection stones for the text walls.

-The first and only intact module, the Control Module, shows an animation of the Probe Tracking Module detaching from the cannon when assessing damage.

-The Nomai attempted to use the Sun Station. More precisely, they attempted to use the Sun Station at a point where they considered the Ash Twin Project complete.
Why would they ever have done that if one of the most important parts of the project, the Probe Tracking Module, was incomplete?

[Vanilla Fish]

Originally posted by Perseus:

It makes more sense to me to complete the cannon in space, in case something went wrong (they were using tornadoes after all, and something did go wrong).
Here's some other counterproofs :

-There's been communications between modules after they were sent to space, as can be seen by using the corresponding projection stones for the text walls.

-The first and only intact module, the Control Module, shows an animation of the Probe Tracking Module detaching from the cannon when assessing damage.

-The Nomai attempted to use the Sun Station. More precisely, they attempted to use the Sun Station at a point where they considered the Ash Twin Project complete.
Why would they ever have done that if one of the most important parts of the project, the Probe Tracking Module, was incomplete?

I'd have to go back and check the dialogue between the modules, but fair second and third points. Spose I just assumed its been down there the whole time because that seemed to fit well enough with the comet bringing all their projects to an abrupt stop compared to the thing managing to find its way to the core every cycle, regardless of the direction it popped off from the cannon.

[Fear Ghoul]

Originally posted by Vanilla Fish:

Originally posted by Black Hayate:

That's quite a stroke of luck, isn't it? (I know I'm looking for details but I'm trying to understand how the developers came up with this particular sequence)
What's more, each loop sends the probe to a different location, which certainly has an impact on the explosion and therefore how the exploded tracking module separates from the station.

I believe the tracking module was sucked to the core during construction (when they were using the tornados to move parts up to the canon to put together) and they never got around to retrieving it or constructing a new one before the project was put on hold and the rest of their history unfolds.

This is in fact what is stated to have happened. They constructed the parts on the planet, then used the tornadoes to launch them into space. The entire reason we learn we can go down below is because of their writings talking about this, how one of the tornadoes instead sucked that part down, and so they studied it.

[Goblin]

Originally posted by Perseus:

Originally posted by Goblin:

and their machinery does not use electricity but some other form of energy they can see with their third eye.

Where is your source? The only reference to Nomai seeing stuff with their third eye that i know of implies nothing of the sort.

I could swear there was more than the text I managed to dig up via google, but basically them wondering what Hearthians' 4th eye does implies their third eye has some function, plus they apparently "can barely see any changes in the sun, even with the third eye" after firing the sun station. Add to that that there are no controls in most places yet they seemingly can control them, and the fact their purple energy doesn't behave like electricity and is generated from contained black and white holes, I feel pretty certain of them at least not using electricity and doing things with telekinesis. Me assuming this involves them seeing some form of energy and manipulating it by sight the way the movable spheres work is a guess, but not an entirely uneducated one if you ask me.

[cf.barbossa]

On both twins, solar collectors are used to generate power. On Ember Twin, one collector array appears to be enough to power to Sunless City or the warp experiment in the HEL. How do you come to the conclusion the energy behaved differently from electricity?

Also, I don't think there is any indication that the Nomai are telekinetics, or that their third eye does anything else but provide visual information.

The sphere switches work just as well for Hearthians as for Nomai, so whatever makes them move the way they do, is part of the tech, not the Nomai's biology.

Concerning the module: It must have been attached to the cannon at some point, because Privet is concerned about it breaking due to Avens ignoring the power limit. If the module would have already been underwater, Privet would not have worried.

The cannon does not so much explode as break apart, so the module might be caught by GDs rather high gravity, regardless of its initial direction. And passing the electrical barrier, well, maybe it's just better insulated or grounded than the famously safe, high-tech and not at all ramshackle spaceships the Hearthians use.

[Fear Ghoul]

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3045886944

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3045890041

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3045890116

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3045890151

[Goblin]

Originally posted by cf.barbossa:

Also, I don't think there is any indication that the Nomai are telekinetics, or that their third eye does anything else but provide visual information.

Have you not met Solanum, who literally makes a bunch of rocks float to form pedestals?

Originally posted by cf.barbossa:

The sphere switches work just as well for Hearthians as for Nomai, so whatever makes them move the way they do, is part of the tech, not the Nomai's biology.

My point was that there's no such controls in many places, yet they still control those places. Maybe the pearl ones are a sort of backup, perhaps for kids if their sight needs to develop or for those whose third eye got hurt. They're only used in some of the most critical systems, plus necessities such as doors and ships which everyone needs to be able to use, but are explicitly missing in the Sun Station. Even the launch of the probe has no method of stopping it, nor any input method Avens could use to set it to launch harder. There clearly IS something there to do so, but we can't see it.