Jade Shadows Discussion

[Agall]

16 minutes ago, JomsvikingSpec said:

I've read through most of the comments here and I could be wrong, but I have my own theory. 

  Hide contents

In Stalkers codex, we know he was at the ceremony. We know his frame is basically a corrupted Excal. What if when he was a low guardian, he wasn't in a warframe? What if Jade was punished and turned into a warframe, but to save Sorren from Tenno blades at the ceremony, Jade also did the same to him to save him? We hear in Jade Shadows that she saved him. Maybe that could be how? Which would explain why in TSD Stalker looks at his own hand and questions his existence. He sees the Tenno transference and the unbreakable bond, and the lengths the Tenno would go to, to save what or who they love. Maybe he wonders if those he was hunting were the true enemy. Hunhow chose Stalker to exact his revenge, maybe he's conflicted? He swore to defend the Orokin and the Tenno betrayed them, maybe he doesn't necessarily hate the Tenno for killing the masters that took Jade, maybe it's because he feels like he failed at his duties. Maybe Tenno aren't good, but maybe Stalker isn't bad. 

 

Spoiler

My interpretation is that both him and Jade were human lower guards of the Orokin, once the Tenno started attacking, the Orokin infected them with the Helminth strain because of the Tenno coup. Stalker's burning memory is blaming the Tenno for ruining his life.

Jade probably had some autonomy comparably once infected, or her burning memory was more protective than emotional. That potentially prevented her from becoming mindless and retaining some consciousness. Either that, or her protective instinct was still there for her partner, regardless of Helminth infection or not.

 

[JomsvikingSpec]

25 minutes ago, Agall said:

  Hide contents

My interpretation is that both him and Jade were human lower guards of the Orokin, once the Tenno started attacking, the Orokin infected them with the Helminth strain 

 

The only flaw I personally see in this is why the Oro would save two random low guardians unless they know something we don't. Why wouldn't they save the masters instead? But then that also reinforces why Sorren still fights to avenge the Orokin and hunt us down. Maybe one day we'll see the answers. 

Edit: My thing about my theory is they said in the quest that the Orokin mustn't find out. Which is why I believe it was a punishment. Either way that leaves room for a massive plot hole when in 3 or 4 years from now, we get Jade Prime. 

Also, I'd love to see an interpretation of the hall and ceremony. Like a DE artwork of the ceremony.

Edited June 19 by JomsvikingSpec

[PublikDomain]

9 hours ago, JustL1me said:

Honestly pretty genius that the design itself was able to hide the spoiler moment right until the end.

That part was pretty well done. There was a lot of promo for this update and looking at it now you notice huh, they really don't show Jade from the front very much. It's all upper torso shots, pics from the side. Oh, that's why. I guess that's also why the gameplay demo in the devstream was prerecorded, so they could make sure Pablo never panned the camera the wrong way. They did a really good job keeping it a secret.

[Agall]

49 minutes ago, JomsvikingSpec said:

The only flaw I personally see in this is why the Oro would save two random low guardians unless they know something we don't. Why wouldn't they save the masters instead? But then that also reinforces why Sorren still fights to avenge the Orokin and hunt us down. Maybe one day we'll see the answers. 

Edit: My thing about my theory is they said in the quest that the Orokin mustn't find out. Which is why I believe it was a punishment. Either way that leaves room for a massive plot hole when in 3 or 4 years from now, we get Jade Prime. 

Also, I'd love to see an interpretation of the hall and ceremony. Like a DE artwork of the ceremony.

Conversion to a Warframe as punishment is a viable theory. I lean on the presumption that they were two random low guardians, but apart of a corp of low guardians that were probably all subjected to the helminth when it came time. Jade and Stalker just being unique. Stalker might've been just another Excalibur Warframe otherwise, but his Umbra style rage made him something else. 

Have we ever got confirmation on why a Warframe ends up as an Excalibur versus an Ash? Is it a different strain or just something that happens because of qualities in the host?

[Keithy55]

9 hours ago, Grizzmoe said:

Pretty sure the Jade we build is also pregnant, how else would there be room for another aura slot?

Omg that makes so much sense for Jade to have a 2nd aura, and I can see why Ballas would design her warframe to be pregnant, probably for fun and/or experimentation e.g. Umbra didn't need to kill his son but Ballas made him do it anyway

[TARINunit9]

6 hours ago, Matthew111005 said:

Eternalism at its finest my friend

That's not even Eternalism. Eternalism would imply that any of these Alad V's had alternate possibilities, which is giving him way too much credit. This is just Warframe Time

[Keithy55]

1 hour ago, JomsvikingSpec said:

I've read through most of the comments here and I could be wrong, but I have my own theory. 

  Hide contents

In Stalkers codex, we know he was at the ceremony. We know his frame is basically a corrupted Excal. What if when he was a low guardian, he wasn't in a warframe? What if Jade was punished and turned into a warframe, but to save Sorren from Tenno blades at the ceremony, Jade also did the same to him to save him? We hear in Jade Shadows that she saved him. Maybe that could be how? Which would explain why in TSD Stalker looks at his own hand and questions his existence. He sees the Tenno transference and the unbreakable bond, and the lengths the Tenno would go to, to save what or who they love. Maybe he wonders if those he was hunting were the true enemy. Hunhow chose Stalker to exact his revenge, maybe he's conflicted? He swore to defend the Orokin and the Tenno betrayed them, maybe he doesn't necessarily hate the Tenno for killing the masters that took Jade, maybe it's because he feels like he failed at his duties. Maybe Tenno aren't good, but maybe Stalker isn't bad. 

 

It could be that Jade volunteered in place of Sorren to be an executioner warframe for the Orokin, kinda like a Hunger Games situation. That would also explain why the ultimate Orokin execution is called the Jade Light: it's literally Jade as the warframe using her powers on them. It's considered mercy because Jade kept her compassion and had an angelic appearance, so to the convicts it looked like an angel had descended to bring them to heaven (or hell I guess)

[JomsvikingSpec]

15 minutes ago, Keithy55 said:

It could be that Jade volunteered in place of Sorren to be an executioner warframe for the Orokin, kinda like a Hunger Games situation. That would also explain why the ultimate Orokin execution is called the Jade Light: it's literally Jade as the warframe using her powers on them. It's considered mercy because Jade kept her compassion and had an angelic appearance, so to the convicts it looked like an angel had descended to bring them to heaven (or hell I guess)

I like this, especially that last line. 

[PublikDomain]

40 minutes ago, Keithy55 said:

That would also explain why the ultimate Orokin execution is called the Jade Light: it's literally Jade as the warframe using her powers on them.

Quote

They opened the chamber door just in time for me to see it happen; the Archimedian erupting into a flash, jade-like and blinding. I knew her. She was the greatest scholar of genetics who ever lived. Except now she was nothing but mist and gore...

But this was back when the Sentients were first being proposed for terraforming Tau. So I dunno if chronologically it makes sense for Jade to be the Jade Light. There's also the Ivara Leverian story that describes the Myrmidon shooting using a green/emerald light as a weapon, so the Orokin must have been able to use it or something similar.

[moondog548]

13 hours ago, (PSN)IdoThea said:

Why?

 

Implies both that women are inherently "baby crazy" and men inherently lack parental instincts/compassion.

[C11H22O1]

25 minutes ago, moondog548 said:

Implies both that women are inherently "baby crazy" and men inherently lack parental instincts/compassion.

??

If you're talking about Stalker then how does he lack parental instincts? he's killing everyone on his path to protect the baby.

If you're talking about the crewmen then they received an order to shoot and actually stopped when she told them to, so I don't see men lacking parental instincts anywhere on this scene.

And she's baby crazy just because she showed sympathy towards the baby?

[moondog548]

2 minutes ago, C11H22O1 said:

??

If you're talking about Stalker then how does he lack parental instincts? he's killing everyone on his path to protect the baby.

If you're talking about the crewmen then they received an order to shoot and actually stopped when she told them to, so I don't see men lacking parental instincts anywhere on this scene.

And she's baby crazy just because she showed sympathy towards the baby?

When posters quote each other you gotta read the full thread, cousin.

[C11H22O1]

41 minutes ago, moondog548 said:

When posters quote each other you gotta read the full thread, cousin.

I did now explain yourself 

[moondog548]

30 minutes ago, C11H22O1 said:

I did now explain yourself 

🙄

1 hour ago, C11H22O1 said:

??

If you're talking about Stalker then how does he lack parental instincts? he's killing everyone on his path to protect the baby.

If you're talking about the crewmen then they received an order to shoot and actually stopped when she told them to, so I don't see men lacking parental instincts anywhere on this scene.

And she's baby crazy just because she showed sympathy towards the baby?

I'm talking about historic trends in fiction and the ways they may or may not reflect on reality. That's what a cliché is.

I wasn't declaring anything about the specifics of this story, other than to point out the cliché they correlate to, which was higlighted by the poster I replied to initially.

(And I'm trying to phrase things very precisely, so if American English doesn't happen to be your primary- or if I'm just not using my words good- my meaning might not come through).

12 hours ago, Grizzmoe said:

Pretty sure the Jade we build is also pregnant, how else would there be room for another aura slot?

Oh.... 😳

[Cram_Duahcim]

11 hours ago, TARINunit9 said:

Remember there are THREE Alad V's on the starchart right now, all from different parts in the story (two of them on the same planet)

Red Stalker will continue to hunt you, Green Stalker is off raising his baby boy, because that's just how time works in Warframe

I mean, with this logic there shouldn't be any reason why we can't replicate our own Stalker for our aresonals.

It was the perfect time to allow for this. Then have Sorren return in an completely new updated appearance. 

I also hope we get to see how the new born warframe pans out....the lore implications here are just absolutely fansinacting.

My only complaint is that they didn't go further back, where we witness The Collapse and the assassination of the Emperors from his, and the other Lower Guardians perspective.

So much potential, that we didn't get with this quest. Thays my only complaint.

[TARINunit9]

1 minute ago, Cram_Duahcim said:

I mean, with this logic there shouldn't be any reason why we can't replicate our own Stalker for our aresonals.

It WOULD be a good time... if Stalker was a Warframe. And I'm still not convinced that he is. Does his chassis count as an Excalibur chassis? Does it count as ANY chassis? Does he have transference bolts or is the Drifter just asking politely? Is that Sorren's original body mutated, or did the original Sorren die during the Collapse and he's himself using transference to stay among the living? We need to answer all this before we can have playable Stalker

[EverdarkRaven]

4 minutes ago, TARINunit9 said:

It WOULD be a good time... if Stalker was a Warframe. And I'm still not convinced that he is. Does his chassis count as an Excalibur chassis? Does it count as ANY chassis? Does he have transference bolts or is the Drifter just asking politely? Is that Sorren's original body mutated, or did the original Sorren die during the Collapse and he's himself using transference to stay among the living? We need to answer all this before we can have playable Stalker

I don't think Stalker is a Warframe. I think the Orokin elite found out that Sorren and Jade were having a baby, which for one reason or another was forbidden. Perhaps Low Guardians are forbidden to have families, or perhaps Jade was a higher class than Sorren and it was a Romeo and Juliet thing. (I don't think this was confirmed, if I'm wrong, please tell me, this is just what I understand from the quest). As punishment they were given to Ballas to experiment on. Ballas turned Jade into a Warframe, but performed other experiments with the Technocyte on Sorren which turned him into the Stalker. Again, please correct me if any of this is incorrect. This is my theory on what the quest was about. 

[PublikDomain]

3 hours ago, TARINunit9 said:

It WOULD be a good time... if Stalker was a Warframe. And I'm still not convinced that he is.

Why wouldn't he be? Or, is there any reason he couldn't be? He is by appearance. So are his Acolytes. He's got powers like we do. Jade is clearly a Warframe - and during the quest the Operator asks if she's "like him". We know the Orokin made a ton of Warframes long before the Tenno and we know that being Warframed was used as a punishment. My guess is that Umbra-like frames that retained their (brainwashed) minds were common even while the Tenno were around, and while we know the Orokin got tired of the original Warframes rebelling after being sent to fight the Sentients there's no reason they couldn't have kept some of the loyal ones around. Like, say, the Low Guardians.

[DeathHasCome1]

Wow this thread really blew up. I see a lot of comments complaining about Jade still having pregnant body, which I understand is weird but like, knowing people who have given birth, its not like the changes just magically go away once the kids born. Granted the stomach does deflate some but like, for the most part those changes take the body a long time to revert (some of which never revert) I think its nice that Jade has her mom bod. Stalker's origins are definitely not fully explained but we'll see if we ever get a follow up (god I hope we do) especially with the kid involved now.

[TARINunit9]

1 hour ago, PublikDomain said:

Why wouldn't he be? Or, is there any reason he couldn't be? He is by appearance

Arthur is just a dude in a suit. He's not a Warframe. (And don't get pedantic with "not yet") This is just what armor looks like in this fictional universe

1 hour ago, PublikDomain said:

He's got powers like we do.

Those are all tech-based. They just slot in and out of your armor. What's the difference between Saryn's Toxic Lash and Teshin's elemental swords in New War? Necramechs had powers. Eximus units have powers

1 hour ago, PublikDomain said:

My guess is that Umbra-like frames that retained their (brainwashed) minds were common even while the Tenno were around, and while we know the Orokin got tired of the original Warframes rebelling after being sent to fight the Sentients there's no reason they couldn't have kept some of the loyal ones around. Like, say, the Low Guardians.

Ok so let me step back from the nitpicking and clarify:

You aren't wrong

We just don't know if you're right

Stalker looks exactly like a Warframe... to us. To the real life humans living in 2024 AD, to the audience playing the video games. This is because we are picking up on artistic and thematic similarities consisting of art style, animation, and gameplay decisions that are not perceptible to the fictional characters in the universe.

The reason I find this important is because of some dialogue from the quest itself. The Corpus Captain takes one look at grainy camera footage, of this biometal monster that can turn invisible and pierce through solid metal walls with a mere bow and arrow... And immediately she can tell it's distinct from a Tenno Warframe. Stalker, to the Corpus, looks absolutely nothing like a Tenno Warframe. That should be absurd, that should make no sense whatsoever, to the audience that computes as well as "1 + 1 = 3." And yet it makes perfect sense to the Corpus. To the Grineer. To the Tenno. And to the Stalker himself. That is just how Warframes and Low Guardians are in this universe

So we come back to the question. Why wouldn't Stalker be a Warframe? Because in many ways you are correct when you say he is a Warframe. Looks exactly like one. He's already playable as one. DE could put him in your inventory right now as a Warframe, because the writers and coders can do whatever they want because all fiction is equally real. Yet they have also insisted he isn't. That within the canon of their universe, he is something that is not a Warframe

[PublikDomain]

1 hour ago, TARINunit9 said:

Stalker looks exactly like a Warframe... to us.

He should look like a Warframe to anyone, though? Because he has literally an Excalibur's body.

Is Excalibur just a guy in a suit? DE's had 11 years to update Stalker's appearance to not be a Warframe if he isn't a Warframe.

1 hour ago, TARINunit9 said:

The Corpus Captain takes one look at grainy camera footage, of this biometal monster that can turn invisible and pierce through solid metal walls with a mere bow and arrow... And immediately she can tell it's distinct from a Tenno Warframe. Stalker, to the Corpus, looks absolutely nothing like a Tenno Warframe.

Well yeah, a Tenno Warframe. The line* you're referring to is "Tenno... No, doesn't fight like a Tenno." But that isn't "doesn't fight like a Warframe". The two aren't the same. This isn't an insistence by the writers that he's not a Warframe. In fact there are lines which suggest that he is a Warframe. Not a Tenno or a Tenno-controlled Warframe, but a Warframe like Umbra and Jade.

Quote

No self, no sense, no death. Just a metal puppet, dangling on Tenno strings. Only the Tenno's death will end your despair.

All your dread-long life you've waited for this moment. But you're asking yourself—was I one of these wretched things? You know the answer. You still hate them. You still hate yourself.

Quote

You're here... for help? For a Warframe?

Why? You hate Warframes. Unless...

is this one... like you?

Edited June 20 by PublikDomain
typo

[OniDax]

11 hours ago, JomsvikingSpec said:

I've read through most of the comments here and I could be wrong, but I have my own theory. 

  Hide contents

In Stalkers codex, we know he was at the ceremony. We know his frame is basically a corrupted Excal. What if when he was a low guardian, he wasn't in a warframe? What if Jade was punished and turned into a warframe, but to save Sorren from Tenno blades at the ceremony, Jade also did the same to him to save him? We hear in Jade Shadows that she saved him. Maybe that could be how? Which would explain why in TSD Stalker looks at his own hand and questions his existence. He sees the Tenno transference and the unbreakable bond, and the lengths the Tenno would go to, to save what or who they love. Maybe he wonders if those he was hunting were the true enemy. Hunhow chose Stalker to exact his revenge, maybe he's conflicted? He swore to defend the Orokin and the Tenno betrayed them, maybe he doesn't necessarily hate the Tenno for killing the masters that took Jade, maybe it's because he feels like he failed at his duties. Maybe Tenno aren't good, but maybe Stalker isn't bad. 

 

 

11 hours ago, Agall said:

  Hide contents

My interpretation is that both him and Jade were human lower guards of the Orokin, once the Tenno started attacking, the Orokin infected them with the Helminth strain because of the Tenno coup. Stalker's burning memory is blaming the Tenno for ruining his life.

 

 

11 hours ago, JomsvikingSpec said:

The only flaw I personally see in this is why the Oro would save two random low guardians unless they know something we don't. Why wouldn't they save the masters instead? But then that also reinforces why Sorren still fights to avenge the Orokin and hunt us down. Maybe one day we'll see the answers. 

Edit: My thing about my theory is they said in the quest that the Orokin mustn't find out. Which is why I believe it was a punishment. Either way that leaves room for a massive plot hole when in 3 or 4 years from now, we get Jade Prime. 

Also, I'd love to see an interpretation of the hall and ceremony. Like a DE artwork of the ceremony.

 

9 hours ago, Keithy55 said:

It could be that Jade volunteered in place of Sorren to be an executioner warframe for the Orokin, kinda like a Hunger Games situation. That would also explain why the ultimate Orokin execution is called the Jade Light: it's literally Jade as the warframe using her powers on them. It's considered mercy because Jade kept her compassion and had an angelic appearance, so to the convicts it looked like an angel had descended to bring them to heaven (or hell I guess)

 

9 hours ago, JomsvikingSpec said:

I like this, especially that last line. 

 

Whole lot of theories, none of which are things the quest implies (because the quest quite literally doesn't even address how or why they became warframes). It's a shame DE didn't care enough to make an actual deep story that explored Stalker's history and that of Jade. 

 

8 hours ago, moondog548 said:

Implies both that women are inherently "baby crazy" and men inherently lack parental instincts/compassion.

 

8 hours ago, C11H22O1 said:

??

If you're talking about Stalker then how does he lack parental instincts? he's killing everyone on his path to protect the baby.

If you're talking about the crewmen then they received an order to shoot and actually stopped when she told them to, so I don't see men lacking parental instincts anywhere on this scene.

And she's baby crazy just because she showed sympathy towards the baby?

 

They're talking about the female Corpus commanded and the male Corpus crewmen. The woman immediately orders a ceasefire because there's a baby (even if they shouldn't think it's real considering there are no aliens in Warframe) while the men don't care and keep shooting. If you actually bothered the read the rest of the thread, you'd recognize that, but you didn't.

 

6 hours ago, EverdarkRaven said:

I don't think Stalker is a Warframe. I think the Orokin elite found out that Sorren and Jade were having a baby, which for one reason or another was forbidden. Perhaps Low Guardians are forbidden to have families, or perhaps Jade was a higher class than Sorren and it was a Romeo and Juliet thing. (I don't think this was confirmed, if I'm wrong, please tell me, this is just what I understand from the quest). As punishment they were given to Ballas to experiment on. Ballas turned Jade into a Warframe, but performed other experiments with the Technocyte on Sorren which turned him into the Stalker. Again, please correct me if any of this is incorrect. This is my theory on what the quest was about. 

 

18 minutes ago, PublikDomain said:

He should look like a Warframe to anyone, though? Because he has literally an Excalibur's body.

Is Excalibur just a guy in a suit? DE's had 11 years to update Stalker's appearance to not be a Warframe if he isn't a Warframe.

Well yeah, a Tenno Warframe. The like you're referring to is "Tenno... No, doesn't fight like a Tenno." But that isn't "doesn't fight like a Warframe". The two aren't the same. This isn't an insistence by the writers that he's not a Warframe. In fact there are lines which suggest that he is a Warframe. Not a Tenno or a Tenno-controlled Warframe, but a Warframe like Umbra and Jade.

Absolutely correct. Stalker is a Warframe, despite this joke of a quest saying otherwise. DE has had 11 years to change Stalker. He's literally an Excalibur frame with a unique helmet and other warframes' powers.

Edited June 20 by OniDax

[TARINunit9]

1 hour ago, PublikDomain said:

Well yeah, a Tenno Warframe. The line* you're referring to is "Tenno... No, doesn't fight like a Tenno." But that isn't "doesn't fight like a Warframe". The two aren't the same. This isn't an insistence by the writers that he's not a Warframe. In fact there are lines which suggest that he is a Warframe. Not a Tenno or a Tenno-controlled Warframe, but a Warframe like Umbra and Jade.

I say again, it's not that you're wrong, we just don't know if you're right. Specifically, we don't know if non-Tenno Warframes exist at all.

It would actually be very easy for DE to answer "yes" if they clarified one other character: the Myrmidon. Ivara's first nemesis, who turned out to be a remote-controlled host body for Ballas. If DE had clarified (either in or out of character) that the Myrmidon was a non-Tenno Warframe then we would pretty definitively know what Stalker is right now

[DeathHasCome1]

14 minutes ago, TARINunit9 said:

I say again, it's not that you're wrong, we just don't know if you're right. Specifically, we don't know if non-Tenno Warframes exist at all.

It would actually be very easy for DE to answer "yes" if they clarified one other character: the Myrmidon. Ivara's first nemesis, who turned out to be a remote-controlled host body for Ballas. If DE had clarified (either in or out of character) that the Myrmidon was a non-Tenno Warframe then we would pretty definitively know what Stalker is right now

I don't know, our operators say pretty definitively during the quest that stalker is a warframe. The exact quote is already above but I'd say our operator saying:
 

You're here... for help? For a Warframe?

Why? You hate Warframes. Unless...

is this one... like you?

 

At least implies that the Stalker is a warframe of some form, though exactly how that works obviously isn't explained, nor is his hate for other warframes.

 

[PublikDomain]

1 minute ago, TARINunit9 said:

It would actually be very easy for DE to answer "yes" if they clarified one other character: the Myrmidon. Ivara's first nemesis, who turned out to be a remote-controlled host body for Ballas. If DE had clarified (either in or out of character) that the Myrmidon was a non-Tenno Warframe then we would pretty definitively know what Stalker is right now

🤔 The Myrmidon? I'm not quite sure where that fits in.