So the Guardians are in fact Thargoid and..

...the ships we are encountering are their Biological AI Ships. Thargoids are either long time dead or remotely guiding the AI ships from a far off permit locked area of the Milky Way.

Evidence in the Spoiler

The ancient sites revealed details about the Guardians… here are some important extracts.

“This led to a surge in weapons development, with biological warfare quickly established as the weapon of choice. An arms race began, focused on the development of biological agents and various counter measures”

“Warfare was conducted using automated battle fleets. At first these were controlled by the Guardians via brain implants, but later they became entirely autonomous. In the early stages of the war the Guardians fought each other directly, but within a decade - and after much loss of life - most of the fighting was conducted remotely. Soldiers were deployed only to occupy areas that had been captured by autonomous or remote vehicles, and eventually were not used at all.”

“As well as biological warfare agents, they also created creatures expressly for use in battle, and these remained effective even into the modern era.”

The major, real proof, comes from the fact that the Ancient Relics are the only other object that the ‘Mothership console accepts’ Which indicates the same Tech

What I draw from this is that the Ancient sites are in fact – Thargoid – The ships we are encountering are the AI Biological Ships and Weapons.
At this point I feel a little sad that all of our insect friends maybe dead – however I do have a glimmer of hope that maybe this information still holds true “most of the fighting was conducted remotely. Soldiers were deployed only to occupy areas that had been captured by autonomous or remote vehicles, and eventually were not used at all”. So maybe, just Maybe, our insect buddies are still around but sat in front of computers directing the AI from afar… in a permit area of our galaxy?

Do you have a similar theory?
 
...the ships we are encountering are their Biological AI Ships. Thargoids are either long time dead or remotely guiding the AI ships from a far off permit locked area of the Milky Way.

Evidence in the Spoiler

The ancient sites revealed details about the Guardians… here are some important extracts.

“This led to a surge in weapons development, with biological warfare quickly established as the weapon of choice. An arms race began, focused on the development of biological agents and various counter measures”

“Warfare was conducted using automated battle fleets. At first these were controlled by the Guardians via brain implants, but later they became entirely autonomous. In the early stages of the war the Guardians fought each other directly, but within a decade - and after much loss of life - most of the fighting was conducted remotely. Soldiers were deployed only to occupy areas that had been captured by autonomous or remote vehicles, and eventually were not used at all.”

“As well as biological warfare agents, they also created creatures expressly for use in battle, and these remained effective even into the modern era.”

The major, real proof, comes from the fact that the Ancient Relics are the only other object that the ‘Mothership console accepts’ Which indicates the same Tech

What I draw from this is that the Ancient sites are in fact – Thargoid – The ships we are encountering are the AI Biological Ships and Weapons.
At this point I feel a little sad that all of our insect friends maybe dead – however I do have a glimmer of hope that maybe this information still holds true “most of the fighting was conducted remotely. Soldiers were deployed only to occupy areas that had been captured by autonomous or remote vehicles, and eventually were not used at all”. So maybe, just Maybe, our insect buddies are still around but sat in front of computers directing the AI from afar… in a permit area of our galaxy?

Do you have a similar theory?

that is one of my theories.

the other is that there was a faction of the ancients that dodnt like the AI, it could be that the thargoids are that faction. either way i think the thargoids and the ancients are connected, thats for sure
 
For what it's worth, and that's not much, I still feel that the Guardians are distinct from whatever it is that made the probes, unknown artefacts, the flower ships, etc. The abandoned ruins have a very different architecture and style to these new bases that have been discovered. We'll find out eventually, I guess.
 
What we see as the flower ships and their tech are definitely Thargoids, there is no doubt. But, Giardians could have been the ones who created Thargoids as as an artificial intelligence and that was what wiped them out. Maybe the superpowers knew about that and that is the reason for their paranoia of AI.
 
I would turn your hypothesis around a little and say that the Guardians were not the Thargoids, but that the Thargoids could be the creatures that were created by the Guardians for use in warfare. As indicated in this quote here:

“As well as biological warfare agents, they also created creatures expressly for use in battle, and these remained effective even into the modern era.”

That is the more likely option considering what you've actually used as your evidence.
Although, I would argue that while the Thargoid navigational computer draws in the Ancient Relic, it exhibits an extreme hostile response as if trying to purge the system and, by way of the Scavengers attacking the CMDRs who provided the relic, trying to quash a sabotage attempt. This doesn't speak to me as them being necessarily the same technology - certainly compatible - but the fact that it's regarded as a hostile act to place Guardian relics into the machine, probably means the Thargoids and Guardians were (or became through uprising) enemies.
 
I don't think the Thargoids are at all a product of the Guardians because the Alliance has ties with the Thargoids. They exchanged technology, information, made peace, and where even given a Thargoid warship. They are their own intelligent species, and the Guardians may just be a different race of Thargoids. The AI ships do make sense though. It explains their bizarre behavior.
 
I don't think the Thargoids are at all a product of the Guardians because the Alliance has ties with the Thargoids. They exchanged technology, information, made peace, and where even given a Thargoid warship. They are their own intelligent species, and the Guardians may just be a different race of Thargoids. The AI ships do make sense though. It explains their bizarre behavior.

Always good to remember, when hypothesising about the Thargoids, is that we have been told by FD that the lore has been "Changed" and a lot of what we know from previous games "Might" not of happened.
 
Cool hypothesis.
I somewhat thought that the Thargoids could have possibly been subjugated by the Guardians and their ongoing hostility towards Guardian tech, but not Human tech, is a throw back to such.

But your hypothesis is also quite good.
 
Thank you for all your input...

One thing bothers me, Thargoids are Insects - None have been found at any crash sites or in the mothership. So currently we have only witnessed the Thargoid AI - Correct? I may be repeating myself though ..
 
Guardians were Humanoid. And they are also extinct. Yes, they did create sentient AI, but Thargoids are organic, ammonia-based life forms. So no. Thargoids are not Guardians.
 
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It would be an interesting twist if FD lets us take on the Thargoids first, just to find them actually fleeing from the AI. New missions - cooperate with Thargoid command, land at their megaships, stock up on EMP and go fight the machines!
 
I would turn your hypothesis around a little and say that the Guardians were not the Thargoids, but that the Thargoids could be the creatures that were created by the Guardians for use in warfare. As indicated in this quote here:

“As well as biological warfare agents, they also created creatures expressly for use in battle, and these remained effective even into the modern era.”

That is the more likely option considering what you've actually used as your evidence.
Although, I would argue that while the Thargoid navigational computer draws in the Ancient Relic, it exhibits an extreme hostile response as if trying to purge the system and, by way of the Scavengers attacking the CMDRs who provided the relic, trying to quash a sabotage attempt. This doesn't speak to me as them being necessarily the same technology - certainly compatible - but the fact that it's regarded as a hostile act to place Guardian relics into the machine, probably means the Thargoids and Guardians were (or became through uprising) enemies.

Yep. I've posted about this several times. I think the Thargoids are the biological constructs left over from the Guardian civil war. Most likely they are from the side that was opposed to the AIs and monolith network, as all Thargoid tech (afaik) is biological and corrosive to "standard" tech.

I also don't think the Thargoids are the only weapon/danger left lying around after that Guardian's war of self-destruction. Several of the lost generation ships that have been found sound like they fell prey to bioweapons (e.g. disease, something that removed ability to have female offspring, weird signal that caused everyone to murder each other, etc.).

The only flaw in this theory is that the Thargoids are supposed to like very cold (by our standards) methane worlds and the Guardians inhabited worlds similar to Earth. However, this could have been something the Guardians wanted in their constructs - ability to live/reproduce on uninhabitable worlds/not compete with Guardians for living space.
 
I don't think the Thargoids are at all a product of the Guardians because the Alliance has ties with the Thargoids. They exchanged technology, information, made peace, and where even given a Thargoid warship. They are their own intelligent species, and the Guardians may just be a different race of Thargoids. The AI ships do make sense though. It explains their bizarre behavior.

Remember that the Thargoids and Guardians are/were both incredibly advanced species, and have been on the galactic stage far longer than Humans.

If the Thargoids were creatures created for war by the Guardians, the Thargoid dealings with the Alliance would have taken place many millions of years after the extinction of the Guardians. It's entirely possible that the Thargoids are the creations of the Guardians and have survived them to become their own advanced, organised, independent and intelligent species.

I think that the lack of actual Thargoid bodies present at crash sites are more a function of the game than a clue to anything - after all, we don't have human bodies strewn around human crash sites, and there are plenty that don't contain escape pods.
 
Guardians were Humanoid. And they are also extinct. Yes, they did create sentient AI, but Thargoids are organic, ammonia-based life forms. So no. Thargoids are not Guardians.


Yes, Thargoids are definitely not Guardians. However, there is a good chance that they are the organic constructs left behind by the Guardians.

It's possible that they are in no way related. However, there are two issues with that:
1. Sentient life is rare in the Elite Dangerous universe. Sentient space-faring life is even rarer. (Braben's view/intent)
2. What are the chances that there would be an alien race, near us, that died 1-2 million years ago and whose tech was more organic/genetic based then inorganic (like ours), and another race that is pure organic tech pops up in the same area?
 
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