Okay, so I was doing the daily bounty grind, got to get that last New Monarchy shader, on Venus. I was doing some patrols when the blight event occurred. Nothing new, blew up some taken and kicked the big dude back to the nth dimension, but a thought lingered in my mind. I thought to myself that I encountered every type of Taken by now, and began to count them off. I got through all of them except the Harpy. I never remembered fighting a Taken Harpy. I also noted that Taken Shanks and Servitors didn’t exist as well, but those are machines not living beings so they cannot be taken by Oryx. I thought I missed something, so I ran through a new guardian just to make sure. Turns out, I haven’t encountered a Taken Harpy. I wondered why.
Why the Harpy?
After digging around in the Grimoire for an hour, I found out where to find a Taken Harpy. They are in the Vault of Glass. They are the Gorgons. I remember doing Vault of Glass for the first time and encountering the Gorgons. I wondered why they didn’t look like a normal Harpy (after the Templar fight, I had seen plenty of Harpies up close). The odd cyan glow to these Gorgons made them stand out from the normal Harpy. Now, a year later, and the Taken King released, I can say that the Gorgon’s look like the Taken form of the Harpies.
I thought that this was a good enough connect to prove the Gorgon is a Taken Harpy, but looks are just circumstantial, I needed something more, a guardian to tell me that they are. We already know that the Vex and Oryx are connected in the fragment XXXVIII where it states;
‘’’ But while Oryx traveled to observe the Deep destroy an ancient fortress world, Crota conspired with his sisters to learn their secrets. ‘I too will experiment with a wound,’ he said. With his sword Crota cut open a new wound, into a new space. In here he thought he might obtain a secret power. Out of this wound came machines called Vex. They invaded Oryx’s throne world.’’’
The Vex came from a wound that Crota made and then fight Oryx. During the battle the Vex mind Quria, Blade Transform, fights Oryx. Fragment XLIII talks about the outcome of the battle;
"Quria shuts down its weapons and puts all its spare resources into sending telemetry to the greater Vex. There will be points in space and time where this data is vital. There will be great projects undertaken in the study of this ontological power, this throne-space."
Notice what type of power the Vex want to obtain. They want the ontological power of throne-space. Ontological means the understanding of being, existence, or reality. So the Vex want to control reality. Sound familiar? The Gorgons have, as the Grimoire card for the Gorgon states, “Gorgons – creatures that seem to possess a dreaded, almost unimaginable strength: an ontological weapon”. This is the data that Quria sent to the greater Vex.
There is also the interesting fact about throne-space. This means that this ontological power only exists in Oryx’s space. This fact is even more interesting when the last part of the Gorgon Grimoire is takne into account. It states “The Gorgons’ ability must be tied to the nature of the Vault of Glass. We can take some solace in the clear fact that the Vex cannot manifest this power in the world outside.” Just like how Oryx cannot manipulate Reality outside of the Ascendant realm, the Gorgons are bound to the Vault-space.
I have my reason why we do not encounter the Taken Harpies on a regular basis. So as we know, the Taken exhibit powers that they desire. This is shown in the Grimoire of the individual taken. For example, the Thrall want to get closer to their enemy, so their taken form has something that is akin to blink. It can reach guardians quicker. So what of the harpies? What is their purpose, what do they want? This is not really solid, but the Grimoire says that the Harpies are used for scouting purposes. Scouts determine what is out there, what exists. So they would want to have the power to determine existence, and thus, what shouldn’t exist. Could the greater Vex have thought of the Taken invasion as a means to obtain the ontological weapon by creating a Vex unit that has the desire to determine existence and reality? Either way, this would also explain why we don’t see taken Harpies in the open worlds. The ontological weapon only works in a pre-determined space. For Oryx, it is the throne-space, and for the Taken Harpies, it is the Vault-space. There are no Taken Harpies roaming the over world because they can’t.
I feel better now that there is a possible explanation for the gap in the Taken. With that out of the way, I can now go on patrol and not worry about these things………..wait a minute...WHERE IS THE TAKEN DREG!!!
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Edited by NobodyJustBrad: 2/28/2016 4:02:32 PMI'm sorry, but this is incorrect. A) the ontological power originated from Oryx's throne space, yes. But that does not mean only the Taken can use it. Quria transmitted the information of ontological power to the Vex network. The Vex then created their own throne space, The Vault of Glass. This is why they cannot use the ontological power anywhere else, as you stated. Also, Gorgons are not the only things in the vault with ontological powers. The oracles also possess this ability. The Vex have used the information from Quria to manufacture their own versions of this ontological power. But here is a difference. For Oryx, his POWER is ontological. For the Vex, they use ontological WEAPONS. Devices that recreate Oryx's ontological power. This feeds into my next point. B) There are not, and never will be, Taken forms of machines. Oryx can only take biological entities. This is because "Taking" them is to take their will. Machines (servitors, shanks, and harpies) do not have a will of their own for Oryx to take. Before anyone tries to say all of the Vex are just machines, I'll stop you there. That is incorrect. Their grimoire clearly states them to be organic. Some versions (goblin, hobgoblin, minotaur, etc) do have an organic life source while others (harpy, cyclops) are just machines. Gorgons cannot be taken Harpies. There is no gap in the Taken roster, except for Dregs. But even then, to be taken is actually a gift. Dregs are Dregs because they have dishonored their fallen race. You could say they are not worthy of being taken until they are a Vandal again. C) you misinterpreted the Taken Thrall ability. Their purpose is to get closer, yes. Taken abilities are meant to cover weakness, to be better forms of themselves, not exhibit what they desire. The thrall ability teleports them SIDEWAYS, not towards the enemy, so they don't die so easily. It literally says that in their grimoire.