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combine structure (incomplete 1 apr 15)

Mar 31st, 2015
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  1. DISPATCH
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  3. 'Dispatch' is the enormously powerful supercomputer at the heart of Combine control on Earth. Able to think for itself without input or oversight, Dispatch is arguably a fully-fledged artificial intelligence, albeit one with a rather limited scope; it exists purely to control the functions of Combine facilities across the planet, as well as personnel and synths. Beyond this vast but limited field, it has no capacity or interest to 'think'.
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  5. Dispatch has a seemingly endless potential for rapid, simultaneous calculations, and regularly processes intelligence from several sources at once into a set of orders for specific units, then issues them all simultaneously with no noticeable lag or delay. The computer's characteristically disjointed, sterile speech belies its capabilities.
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  7. SCANNERS
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  9. The basic surveillance unit of the Combine authorities, Scanners are autonomous flying sensor platforms directed by Dispatch and deployed from the Citadel itself. These roughly football-sized drones are gifted with a basic form of artificial intelligence; they are nowhere near as advanced as Dispatch, but they are capable of 'understanding' their surroundings to a limited capacity.
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  11. Brand-new scanners are 'inexperienced'; without a concrete knowledge of what is normal and what is not, they behave rather like young human children. As a scanner learns to distinguish its normal environment from objects of interest, it will spend less time curiously chasing crows or observing its own reflection in bodies of water and will instead begin to discriminate against unfamiliar human faces or patterns of behaviour.
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  13. Scanners have a degree of self-awareness usually found in animals of moderate intellect, a feature which is perhaps not as noticeable in the cold, calculating nature of Dispatch. They will respond to new or unexpected stimuli even if it interferes with their directives, and will sometimes even appear to try and amuse themselves. They are highly vocal, but it is not clear whether this is a form of communication or if it is, who it is directed at.
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  15. For these reasons, scanners will become very interested in new arrivals to their area of operations, often snapping photographs of them as soon as they step off of a relocation train. Photographs are not observed by actual humans – in fact, humans have nothing to do with the scanners' control or intelligence – but are rather fed back into the massive database at the heart of the Combine Dispatch system.
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  17. Once a face has been archived, it enters the pool of 'known stimuli', and from that point scanners will generally ignore the person in question unless they are flagged as a person of interest or are engaging in unfamiliar behaviour, such as climbing gutters, crawling about on rooftops, wearing non-standard clothes, carrying unidentified items or contraband, or similar. For similar reasons, scanners may notice blatant manipulation of the environment, but will be unable to tell makeshift camouflaging and repairs to a structure apart from the actual built environment around it.
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  19. Thanks to the scanners' nature, it is not particularly difficult to go unnoticed even in a heavily surveilled area, so long as one's face is not flagged and one does not act out from what a regular citizen would be expected to do. Scanners will also ignore low miscounts, unless they are substantially lower than seems reasonable; they simply perform a headcount rather than a detailed analysis of who is where, and low miscounts are allowed for to account for attrition. However, a high miscount – even if only by a handful – will immediately flag the district for Dispatch attention, necessitating place-trades if outlanders wish to re-enter the city overtly.
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  21. MANHACKS
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  23. Much simpler than scanners, manhacks do not perform surveillance duties or identify persons of interest. In fact, they can scarcely even tell where they're going; the only real 'thinking' a manhack does is to constantly compare its current surroundings with reference points that Dispatch constantly feeds it. This also extends to targets, making manhacks a poor choice for surgical strikes and in fact basically useless for anything other than flushing out an enclosed area wholesale (without having to worry about the eventual clean-up associated with headcrab shelling).
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  25. “Manhack arcades” - need to cover this. Hit me if this text is still here.
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  27. CIVIL PROTECTION
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  29. "CP/Metrocops are humans at the first level--basically unaltered volunteers. From here, if you are hardcore, you must volunteer for modification in order to become a soldier, so advancing in rank requires surrendering even more humanity. This stuff was certainly thought through in advance; sometimes we just make things up though.
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  31. “They are the lowest form of human security organized and run by the Combine. Ones who show aptitude may be promoted to soldiers. Ones who don't are probably treated like damaged equipment by management; if it's more expensive to repair them than they're worth, they are probably just discarded. Their buddies might try to save them, I guess--but the ones who don't bother will get promoted faster, and the ones who show weakness are probably going to wash out pretty quickly.”
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  33. “Metrocops are the first step--originally I wanted to be able to transmit conversations between bored metrocops. They are still just human volunteers. Combine Soldiers are a step beyond that, and submit to certain processes that remove autonomy and weaponize certain other aspects of humanity unrelated to freewill. So you won't hear them cracking jokes or disobeying orders.” - Marc Laidlaw, Valve Software
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  35. The basic enforcement arm of the Combine, Civil Protection are ubiquitous throughout the city but never venture beyond it. They are simply humans who have entered the employ of the Combine, either willingly or through coercion, and are rewarded for instilling fear and pain in their fellow man. Although many units may have a softer side or may even be aiding the resistance covertly, the prime motivator for violence tends to be boredom and contempt for the 'weak' citizens.
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  37. Civil Protection operate in informal teams of two to six officers, with three or four being a median squad size. They are not a part of fixed squads, and do not hold strict ranks; rather, a team is assembled prior to deployment, assigned a Dispatch callsign, and then a team leader role is assigned based on seniority. CP teams do not coordinate with each other as a general rule, but rather answer directly to Dispatch, which interprets messages and modifies the orders of other teams as necessary.
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  39. This arrangement makes the Civil Protection a rather slow and ungainly force, as two or three teams may be operating in the same area with no real communication between them. Dispatch has general strategic control; team leaders communicate with Dispatch and make tactical decisions which the computer cannot process due to lack of information. While the team leader is the only member of the squad to speak to the computer directly, all squad members receive incoming orders, removing any need for the team leader to relay these to their colleagues.
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  41. While on duty, a team will generally mill around their assigned patrol area or often simply lounge about until the end of their shift or a situation develops. Most units are not particularly professional, tending to be rather slovenly, leaning against walls or sitting atop APCs. Units may engage in private conversations over their team's short-ranged communications equipment, or antagonise passing citizens. The primary reason citizens should find Civil Protection units intimidating is their unpredictability rather than any threat of Nova Prospekt; there are few things more dangerous than a bored CP.
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  43. A team sticks together, generally being assigned a general area to patrol and then spreading out as needed. At no time is a team spread over an area of more than a hundred metres, and similarly, they are to remain within direct line of sight of at least one other unit in their team at all times to avoid mugging or hostage incidents.
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  45. Each team remains active for the duration of its shift, minus preparation and debriefing time. These shifts may last three or six hours, based on current demand for units and other variables processed by Dispatch. During this shift units are expected not to remove their masks outside of approved marshalling points, smoke, eat or drink, or use public conveniences. However, these restrictions are often disregarded in practice; Dispatch can only tell where its units are, not what precisely it is that they are doing. Units in higher-traffic areas or operating in conjunction with other assets (such as large numbers of scanners or Airwatch oversight) will usually behave in a more professional fashion.
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  47. The compliance of Civil Protection units is awarded by slightly better rations, better accommodation, and even rewards like 'non-mechanical reproduction simulation'; off-duty units are usually quartered in different districts than the regular citizenry in order to avoid fraternisation or reprisals.
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  49. OVERWATCH
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  51. Overwatch is the military arm of the Combine, operating from the Citadel and a staging point just beyond the inner wall known as the Nexus. This used to be some kind of government building or museum before the war, and now serves as a convenient marshalling area and armoury for the ground forces within the city.
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  53. Rarely seen within the city itself, Overwatch are only called in if there is a major uprising that the Civil Protection can't handle, or if an important area becomes totally infested by Xen wildlife (including headcrabs and their victims). In the outlands, Overwatch occasionally mounts standing patrols around the edges of the city's apron and will deploy surgical strike teams as needed; however, the Combine largely follow a policy of live and let live when it comes to outlanders, seeing little reason to expend energy in neutralising something that is not really a threat to them.
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  55. Unlike Civil Protection, Overwatch soldiers are transhumanised. During surgery at Nova Prospekt, these troops have had their bodies extensively augmented, slightly improving strength and endurance, dulling response to pain, largely limiting capacity for independent thought, and removal of redundant organs.
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  57. Although they are not mindless automatons, Overwatch soldiers display little initiative and seem incapable of free thought. Even their capacity for cruelty seems to have been dulled, as it takes a back seat to efficient delivery of death; when compared to an average pre-war human soldier, Overwatch fight harder for longer, and although they do feel pain and have a vestigial self-preservation instinct, they can often fight through after being badly wounded.
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  59. The senses of an Overwatch soldier have all been slightly improved upon by the Combine, increasing their hearing range (both in terms of distance and frequency) somewhat and improving the resolution of their eyesight. However, Overwatch troops do not have thermal vision, and their masks feature only a very rudimentary image intensification night vision system. One noteworthy oversight in the 'design' of the Overwatch soldier's equipment is the loss of both smell and touch – their mask filters most particulates out of the air, dulling (but not totally removing) their ability to smell, while their total lack of exposed skin while in uniform makes it impossible to feel the texture of objects or the ambient temperature and humidity.
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  61. Overwatch troops do not have off-duty time in the same way Civil Protection units do. With their digestive tract being truncated to a simple feeding/waste port system, 'off-duty' Overwatch units are hooked up to a nourishment device that feeds and repairs the body while the mind is subject to virtual-reality training and propaganda. Overwatch units never truly sleep in the traditional sense.
  62.  
  63. AIRWATCH
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