So, where are the Rebs making all this stuff?

[Narvi]

Man, the rebels are constructive people. They've somehow designed, implemented, and produced an effective gravity gun under grim occupation. They maintain a hidden dam base - which they have stacked out with turrets and "futuristic" generators. They built a working teleporter, and they've somehow worked out how advanced Combine tech works - in only just ten to twenty years. And in Episode 2 (as seen in various trailers) they've designed, and, somehow, mass produced, an anti-synth weapon... specifically the strider buster.

I realize the strider buster thing might be a stretch (since Episode 2 isn't even out yet) but it appears to be around in significant numbers. Precisely what kind of industrial base do the rebels have here? They've built a laser-guided rocket launcher, and fitted out several of their soldiers with it, (assuming it's not something looted from the Combine), and made bastard bridges across buildings using scrap material. Heck, they've built a f**cking scout car, a dune buggy, and an air boat out of scrap materials. The vehicles are fine, yeah, you can build stuff out of the material at hand (though it shows that the rebels are f**cking fine scientists and engineers), but advanced stuff like the parts for the grav gun (which doesn't exactly look cobbled together) and the generator that powers it, as well as those strider busters, require a small industrial base to churn out in large quantities. (Yes, I know the gravity gun isn't mass produced. But the strider buster appears to be. Shut up.) Let's not forget that they've built a robotic dog and advanced visual communication equipment. Oh, and they've built a battery-powered crossbow which launches a steel rebar (which have been cut at lengths so accurate as to make factory-standardized ammunition, oh, and has also been heated red-hot by electricity from the battery), at high speeds towards the target, with a scope. *Takes breath*, and it also doesn't electrocute you the first time an untrained man uses it.

Most of the stuff can be rationalized away, like Dog being made mostly from Combine parts, and the teleporter being made from cribbed combine material; but where does the strider buster or the gravity gun or the HEV suit fit into this? I mean, you need to melt down and manufacture parts and chips and things; this is not a simple case of inventively welding together pre-manufactured parts so they run.

It was a thought of mine that Black Mesa East might have its own manufactury hidden inside its corridors, but after it fell I doubt much got out. So, I think the rebels may have their own hidden factory out in the woods, or secreted among Combine-run factories and the such (where basic amenities such as brick are made ).

So, thoughts?

 

[Darkside55]

As you've already guessed, a lot of parts have been "procured" from the Combine. Things like raw materials, all sorts of gadgets and parts that allow the rebels to build who-knows-what. Some of that stuff is human tech left over from before the Combine occupation, smuggled or stockpiled. The rocket launcher is one such thing; this was a piece of technology left over from before the war (and used in it). We used an earlier model of this RPG in Half-Life.

The HEV suit was built pre-Combine, only modified into its current form (Mark V).

The generators in Black Mesa East are either generators from the dam or stuff that was taken and hauled. Never gave much thought to it. The rebels have sufficient manpower to be able to smuggle stuff like that though, especially if its enough on the fringe of Combine territory to go unnoticed.

The strider buster has been built by scientists out in the wild, probably by reverse-engineering liberated Combine tech. You have to remember, the City 17 branch is the head of the human resistance against the Combine, and there is an entire team of scientists, both pre- and post- Black Mesa (NM, not East), who have taken to developing technologies against the Combine. You have a bunch of brainiacs sitting out in the woods with soldiers (or maybe better to call them scavengers in this case) going out into the field and grabbing whatever they can and bringing it back. The resistance makes its home in places where technology was present, as well...like abandoned missile silos.

So they don't have any factories, they just cobble together what they can, and some of that stuff tends to be really impressive. Think of the rebels as MacGyver...there's a lot you can do with a battery pack, a handle off an old gun, some high-tensile wire, and some rebar.

 

[Dog--]

They just put weapon_physcannon in console for Gravity Gun.
Impulse101 for all their weapons.

 

[Calhoun]

They just put weapon_physcannon in console for Gravity Gun.
Impulse101 for all their weapons.

And that's why the rebels are banned from being in cities controlled by The Combine.

 

[Narvi]

It's not very apparent first playthrough, (hell, I noticed it only on my seventh), but a generator in BM East is basically a big-ass gravity gun generator. Orangish glow and everything.

 

[bboymatty]

^ similar yes. I think its design is to demonstrate the exotic nature of the teleportation system.

 

[madog]

hl2 has tons of little things that dont quite add up to what is real but its a game and sometimes we have to let those things fly. Like the fact that you don't need a helmet for radiation.

 

[Jintor]

 

[bigburpco]

Classic.

 

[the cheese]

Forget the hi-tech equipment, I want to know where they got all those hats!

 

[bigburpco]

They sew in their free time, of course!

 

[Jintor]

And they've got lots of free time.

 

[Darkside55]

And they can't afford to catch a cold.

(Props if you get the reference)

 

[Jintor]

If you don't have beanies... you catch a cold? Um... suppression field means no reproduction?

???!???!?

 

[99.vikram]

I've heard of real-life rebels building generators and dynamos from scrap metal.
With Eli and Kleiner, I'd be surprised if they didn't build high tech stuff in the rebel bases.

 

[Darkside55]

If you don't have beanies... you catch a cold? Um... suppression field means no reproduction?

Heh, I wasn't thinking about it in that context. The quote was from "Leon: The Professional." When asked why he always puts that beanie on, he says, "I can't afford to catch a cold."

 

[Gordon-Shepherd]

why must barney die for the good of the story? I always thought of him as a slight comic relief.

like a quick whizz in a printing press.

 

[delusional]

wrong thread gordon-shephard?

 

[Ophiguris]

Man, the rebels are constructive people. They've somehow designed, implemented, and produced an effective gravity gun under grim occupation. They maintain a hidden dam base - which they have stacked out with turrets and "futuristic" generators. They built a working teleporter, and they've somehow worked out how advanced Combine tech works - in only just ten to twenty years. And in Episode 2 (as seen in various trailers) they've designed, and, somehow, mass produced, an anti-synth weapon... specifically the strider buster.

I realize the strider buster thing might be a stretch (since Episode 2 isn't even out yet) but it appears to be around in significant numbers. Precisely what kind of industrial base do the rebels have here? They've built a laser-guided rocket launcher, and fitted out several of their soldiers with it, (assuming it's not something looted from the Combine), and made bastard bridges across buildings using scrap material. Heck, they've built a f**cking scout car, a dune buggy, and an air boat out of scrap materials. The vehicles are fine, yeah, you can build stuff out of the material at hand (though it shows that the rebels are f**cking fine scientists and engineers), but advanced stuff like the parts for the grav gun (which doesn't exactly look cobbled together) and the generator that powers it, as well as those strider busters, require a small industrial base to churn out in large quantities. (Yes, I know the gravity gun isn't mass produced. But the strider buster appears to be. Shut up.) Let's not forget that they've built a robotic dog and advanced visual communication equipment. Oh, and they've built a battery-powered crossbow which launches a steel rebar (which have been cut at lengths so accurate as to make factory-standardized ammunition, oh, and has also been heated red-hot by electricity from the battery), at high speeds towards the target, with a scope. *Takes breath*, and it also doesn't electrocute you the first time an untrained man uses it.

Most of the stuff can be rationalized away, like Dog being made mostly from Combine parts, and the teleporter being made from cribbed combine material; but where does the strider buster or the gravity gun or the HEV suit fit into this? I mean, you need to melt down and manufacture parts and chips and things; this is not a simple case of inventively welding together pre-manufactured parts so they run.

It was a thought of mine that Black Mesa East might have its own manufactury hidden inside its corridors, but after it fell I doubt much got out. So, I think the rebels may have their own hidden factory out in the woods, or secreted among Combine-run factories and the such (where basic amenities such as brick are made ).

So, thoughts?

It would seem that most of this was developed at BM. Most of the stuff in your thread, you already answered in the first post. They probably have a transport way to get stuff from what might be a combine scrap yard...