The hive queen wars

[GodInYourEyes]

did the hive queens have wars on thier planet?

why in the world would they have wepons if they didnt?

[Eddie Pinz]

I don't think it would make much sense for the hive queens to war. No body really knows how many queens there were, but I don't think that their numbers would be too great and could/would probably wipe each other out in a war.

I always just assumed that they developed weapons for the sake of expansion. They were on multiple worlds, who knows how many other races they could have wiped out on their way to Earth.

[jotabe]

Actually, IIRC, the hive queens did wage war on each other, on a time previous to their planetary expansion. I think it was said in the part of the novel where it's told how Ender writes The Hive Queen.

Let me look for the quote...

OSC wrote:

Ender told the story quickly, as if it were an ancient memory. When he came to the tale of the great mother, the queen of all, who first learned to keep and teach the new queen instead of killing her or driving her away, then he lingered, telling how many times she had finally to destroy the child of her body, the new self that was not herself, until she bore one who understood her quest for harmony. This was a new thing in the world, two queens that loved and helped each other instead of battling, and together they were stronger than any other hive. They prospered; they had more daughters who joined them in peace; it was the beginning of wisdom.

[Eddie Pinz]

That sounds about right. Shows how much I know.

[Dr. Mobius]

Yes, but is that ancient history or relatively recent? If it's ancient history and we were the first sentient alien race the buggers found, why would they need to develop technologies for war, even as a byproduct of peaceful tech?

A rogue queen perhaps, but according the Jota's passage, such a being would've been destroyed at birth before it could develop into a real threat.

It's also possible that the queens ignorantly destroyed other races the way they almost did us, but you'd think we would've found traces of their existence on the bugger worlds we colonized.

Although I never really thought about it before, it's my belief that the buggers didn't develop the bulk of their weapons until they discovered they'd need them if they wanted to colonize our solar system. Using our violent capabilities as a template combined with memories of their own violent past and the prerequisites they possessed from peaceful technologies, they developed their weapons of war in preparation for the second invasion.

[jotabe]

I go with Pinz's interpretation.
After all, we still need ways to fight plagues off, whether they are insects or small mammals.
As vast as the formic dominions were, probably large beasts could threaten their colony, so they would need ways to control them.

Not only that... to create their cities in the the colonial planets, they would need to clear large portions of territory, and for that they would also need explosives or weapons.

[GodInYourEyes]

Not only that... to create their cities in the the colonial planets, they would need to clear large portions of territory, and for that they would also need explosives or weapons.

then why did we have a hard time killing them?
if they had weapons "to clear large portions of territory" and we had weapons
to distroy cities and kill armys. they had weapons on thier starships to fight in space.

[Eaquae Legit]

Anyone know the timeline between the first and second invasion? Which was the one where China got razed to the ground? I don't remember it being a very long time between the two, and it'd be hard to develop such devastating weapons from nothing in that time.

[jotabe]

China was wiped in the First Invasion. I think the Second Invasion was fought exclusively in the space.

I am not sure that the First Invasion was exactly an attack... i am not sure what it was lol A bit too harsh to be simple recon.

[zeroguy]

I am not sure that the First Invasion was exactly an attack... i am not sure what it was lol A bit too harsh to be simple recon.

Remember that buggers at first didn't think about life the same way we do. Killing individual people didn't really mean a whole lot to a race whose thoughts were all together as one. I believe Rackham compared it to clipping toenails. That's all before the Hive Queen got in Ender's head, though.

And their weapons sucked in the first invasion, comparatively to the rest. As did ours. The second invasion was the more serious one; the one we only won because of Rackham's move. I believe their weapons also were inferior to ours later on, if I recally correctly. (In general; not specifically talking about the MD device.)

[neo-dragon]

China was wiped in the First Invasion. I think the Second Invasion was fought exclusively in the space.

I think you're right, and I think that the Second Invasion was about 30 years after the First. I'm not sure where that's mentioned though. In fact, does anyone remember where it was said that China was attacked in the First Invasion. I could have sworn it was in EG, but I re-read it recently and unless I missed it, I don't recall anything being revealed about the First Invasion at all... Was it only discussed in the Shadow books?

[Eaquae Legit]

If the First Invasion saw the razing of China, then the buggers definitely had weapons and war technology before they encountered humans.

[zeroguy]

If the First Invasion saw the razing of China, then the buggers definitely had weapons and war technology before they encountered humans.

I don't think it's necessarily a war technology. You need to clear large amounts of land sometimes when terraforming planets... and they cleared large amounts of land.

The weapons against ships is more suspect, though (i.e. how they got to China in order to raze it in the first place). They must have observed us for some time before attacking, wouldn't they? Eros dissappearing only happened shortly before any attacks (if I recall correctly), but that doesn't mean they weren't observing unobserved beforehand. I can't think of any evidence cotradicting or supporting this off the top of my head, anyone got anything?

[Eaquae Legit]

Yeah, I was including the "getting past all our defences" thing under the razing of China.

[buckfan328]

The books do mention that there were wars on their planet so that would explain at least them having a concept of war and primitive weapons.

The question of starship weapons is a good one but allow me to offer a possible explanation. First, I think that terraforming explains why they might possess ship to ground weapons. Also, space travel and light speed travel requires the ability to manipulate large amounts of energy. If you can build a rocket, you can very quickly learn to build a bomb or a missile once the need presents itself. Again destroying asteroids or space debris might be one explanation for something that could be improvised as a ship to ship weapon.

The key point I think is this: The first invasion was a chance encounter on both sides. I think the books imply that the humans didn't have very many if any defenses to "get through" on the way to razing China. I think they also imply that the ship to ship weapons of both sides were not very good, this is implied by all of the extravehicular and hand to hand combat in the first war. It seems that in many cases the sides had to board each others ships to put them out of action. There are many plausible reasons why the buggers might have personal weapons (large animals/predators) or adapted personal weapons (things designed for blowing through obstacles and such). The lack of power of the ship to ship weapons can be explained. On the human side, probably because they didn't have a need to transport weaponry into space/lack of technological development. On the bugger side, possibly because of the question you raised: the weapons the used were improvised.

As for the second invasion, the buggers certainly had some time to adapt and develop new weaponry to exterminate what they obviously considered to be a particularly dangerous pest. Given that they are very good at manipulating energy already (after all, lots of manufacturing/research tools can be very lethal i.e. lasers). That they are otherwise advanced (they could have missile and rail gun like weaponry to move unmanned payloads around in space). It is not hard to imagine that even a short period of weapons development would allow them to outclass humans.

Finally I agree that during the third war, after humans have stolen much of the basic bugger technology, it seems they are more gifted at developing weaponry than the buggers.

[neggiw redne]

Finally I agree that during the third war, after humans have stolen much of the basic bugger technology, it seems they are more gifted at developing weaponry than the buggers.

we weren't more gifted at developing weapons, however as humans we were more experienced and more careless about it, as is discussed later in the speaker series. our ownership of even one m.d. device could destroy everything, just imagine what would happen if some idiot like that captain(the one who tried to destroy ender's last world) accidently (or purposefully) fired one at a black hole, the reaction would eleminate a very good portion of the galaxy, possibly even the whole thing.