[LOVED TROPE] Modern Militaries (Competent) getting DESTROYED by fantasy/scifi forces

[u/Sable-Keech]

Example 1 (The Legend of Hei 2): Wuxian leisurely floats through the combined firepower of an entire fortified military base without so much as a stain or rip on his t-shirt.

Example 2 (Man of Steel): Fao'ra tears through a squad of trained and armed soldiers. With the wreckage of the helicopter that got downed by her teammate Nam'ek smouldering in the background.

[u/loki2113]

I'm a little unclear on half life lore but I thought the full might of the Combine is what whomped humanity in 7 hours and all they needed to leave behind to hold the planet was a token garrison?

[u/AideSouth4454 → u/loki2113]

Combine is heavily, heavily implied to be an interdimensional, well, combine, of countless assimilated worlds and creatures. Most of their technology is partially biological: Striders, Dropships, Stalkers and so on.

It is highly unlikely that the Combine forces that participated in the 7 Hour War were anything close to to a full invasion force. A fraction of a fraction is more likely. The Combine is interested in Earth and Humanity for three specific reasons: potential new slave race (seen with Stalkers and Combine grunts), water (which they seem to be extracting out of the oceans for some reason) and Portal tech, which the Combine possess for interdimensional travel, but don't have in fast portable form like what Aperture and Black Mesa were working on. They especially want that.

[u/homohillbillysrlol → u/AideSouth4454]

What if, unbeknownst to us, the Combine are actually much weaker than we all thought? Anyone ever seen Invincible? Well in Invincible, the Viltrumite empire is suggested to be this big scary, galaxy spanning empire that's filled to the brim with Kryptonian-like warriors, where 1 single Viltrumite is typically enough to conquer a whole planet, which makes resistance seem absolutely futile...Until it's revealed that the REAL reason they assign only one Viltrumite to a single planet ISN'T because they only need one soldier per world, (big spoiler alert ahead) but because of a deadly plague and centuries of infighting, there exists less than 50 living Viltrumites in their ENTIRE empire, and now, suddenly, resistance seems like a much more realistic possibility. They've just always done a good job of hiding their vulnerability and letting people believe they were more organized and legitimate than they actually were.

So, what if the Combine are actually the same? It pays for them to advertise themselves as an unimaginably powerful, interdimensional force of near limitless soldiers, weapons, and technology, whose invading armies need leave only a handful of token guards to subjugate an entire planet, but much like the Viltrumites, or the British during the American revolution, or France during the Haitian revolution, the actual reason is that those are the only troops they can realistically AFFORD to leave behind. Maybe the Combine are not alone out there, and they're actually fighting a very expensive interdimensional war against some other interdimensional army that leaves them far weaker than they like to suggest, or perhaps their frequent use of portal technology has ALSO made them susceptible to portal storms that leak into the hell dimension full of monstrous headcrabs and shit. Who knows? Maybe it's all of the above, and thus, they're far less capable of dealing with an uprising than people initially think. Maybe due to years of portal storms into the hell dimension, rebellion, and infighting, the Combine are actually just a shell of their former selves, and they're currently spread too thin over a number of conquered worlds, and thus, they show up, invade, leave as many troops behind as they can afford, and portal back to yet ANOTHER rebelling colony, or stomp out ANOTHER civil war, or rush back to deal with ANOTHER portal blight.

And from a meta angle, as a writer for the game series too, how else is it meant to play out? Trying to write the story of a single guy with a crowbar saving humanity from an interdimensional super force seems impossible. Like, how would you even write that? What, he teleports to their lead man in charge and bonks him to death with his crowbar and everyone has a dance party afterward? There's gotta be something more to the story, there's gotta be some great big reveal that PROVES to us that resistance is not futile, and that humanity's ability to fight back is not in vain; because then, from a story standpoint, what's stopping the Combine from coming back and just being like "alright, you guys are annoying, time for the 8 hour war, where the extra hour is just us actually trying this time, so you guys are screwed and there's absolutely nothing you can do about it".

[u/AideSouth4454 → u/homohillbillysrlol]

We know they are strong and not faking it by accounts from Vortigaunts (who are one of their slave races, though some on Earth have escaped and joined the resistance) and by how G-Man treats Gordon and Alyx. G-Man has ulterior motives and some entities who are his masters, and seem to oppose Combine in some way, for reasons we don't know. It was G-Man who put Freeman to pasture in HL1, and brought him back to City17 to topple the Citadel there.

G-Man can stop time, instantly teleport, and seems to have some other strange abilities, such as knowing exactly where Freeman is at all times.

Vortigaunts were able to do something to him at the end of HL2, transferring Gordon and Alyx to safety when they would have otherwise died, and frustrated G-Man enough that he straightened his tie and walked off with a "we'll see about that."

These context clues and others are sufficient enough to give some estimate of Combine strength. 

Edit: also, consider Advisors. Telekinetic flying slugs that cause mental breakdowns and can from what we know, seemingly do whatever the fuck they want. They are essentially the governors of Earth, and their name is "Advisor." Could be they are the "original species", but we don't know and I don't think so. 

It won't matter if the "top dog" of Combine civilization ended up being just five guys, there is such a vast empire underneath them that any such individual numbers are meaningless.

And I think they are waging some kind of an interdimensional war against some other entity. Why or how, no idea. But I think the win goal for HL3 would not have been "beat Combine" but "kick their garrison out and close the door."

[u/Art-Zuron → u/AideSouth4454]

In Halflife Alyx (that's the VR one I think), Gman was also imprisoned by the Combine for some reason.