http://starbounder.org/Vanguard's_Set I've started this discussion on the idea that there may be - or at the very least, may have been before the tentacles - in the game lore other branches of the human military besides the USCM - in this case, as the link to the armor set above shows, the Vanguard. The most telling description is that of the helmet, which states: As you can see, even though it is never referred to directly in the game's codexes (Besides, if we were going only by the codexes there would be almost zero Hylotl lore), the helmet appears to indicate that there is a vanguard, that it is likely separate from the USCM, and that it is part of the human military. The issue arrives in figuring out the specifics, in that nobody seems to know anything about the vanguard - in my own case, I was essentially laughed off of Marathon for suggesting that there could be a character who had been a member of the human military but not the USCM, and accused of "trying to force my way into the USCM" when I brought up the vanguard. As such, I've decided to start this thread in order to discuss a few things: - Firstly, whether it can be presumed by the information in the armor set that the vanguard exists or did exist, - Secondly, whether the vanguard should be considered for the purposes of the RP to be, or to have been, separate from the USCM, - Thirdly, whether it is possible to have a character whose backstory includes having been a member of this group. My personal inference based off of the above information is that the vanguard might have been the army to the USCM's marines, and would have been fighting on and around Earth while the USCM would be doing the colonizing and dealing with alien races. I'm by no means an expert on the lore, so if there is further information on it or I've gotten something wrong an answer would be appreciated. -DeltaV
A single armor set is pretty iffy considering a great deal of item descriptions and other lore such as codices contradict each other. Not to mention that the Vanguard set is the only reference to the Vanguard.
It also wouldn't make any sense that the only branch of the human military would be the United Systems Colonial Marines - what about the places that aren't colonies? And considering there's only just over a dozen human codexes in the game at this point, you can't discount lore just because it only appears briefly.
Just because it is named the Colonial Marines doesn't mean it operated only on colonies. There are canonical references to them operating in Sol. Not to mention when the United States Marine Corps was first established they were referred to as the Colonial Marines.
That is a good point, but it still doesn't explain why the USCM would be the only 'modern' human military force that existed, just like the marines aren't the only part of the United States' real-life military. Even ignoring all of that, it's stated in the very first bit of lore that the humans were fighting each other over Mars, which tells us that at the very least there have to be more than one human military organization than the USCM, because they're not going to fight themselves.
Well, the description of the chestplate puts a lot of emphasis on the strength of the flak jacket, and how it's saved lives; perhaps the vanguard is known for being heavily armored? That is the issue with the low amount of information given, but just because it's not an integral part of the current lore doesn't mean that it isn't, or couldn't be, a part at all.
It could be referring to armoured warfare (as in tanks and supporting infantry), a quick look says that the term "U.S. Armored Forces" has been used before. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armoured_warfare
Flak jacket and heavily armored seems like an oxymoron to me. Either way, for the argument about the USCM being the only branch.. it's not. We commonly refer to and have Navy personnel. With the Vanguard being similar to the Army? That's assuming if they found it relevant to still have two ground branches. In the future where wars can span numerous planets and systems, they may very well have put an emphasis on the USCM over other ground branches because amphibious/interstellar warfare capability would be key.
As I've said above, low emphasis =/= doesn't and/or shouldn't exist. Obviously the final decision is probably going to go to a mod, but I don't see why I should be accused of trying to force my way into the USCM for having a character who was a part of the vanguard. My leading theory for placing the vanguard as being primarily on Earth is precisely because they get little mention, which would make sense if most of them were killed by tentacles and they didn't have colonies everywhere like the USCM.
Armored forces makes me think that the vanguard might be pilots of the human military's tanks, or maybe in Starbound's case, Mech pilots. In a military setting ''Armour'' can mean tanks and other armoured vehicles.
Guys, guys, you got it all wrong. All this speculation is just heading in the wrong direction. It's pretty clear what the Vanguard does, and what he'll always do. It's literally in his name. He guards vans.
