Destiny 2 Lore - How Vex simulations let them play god! How do you know you're not a simulation? 

Praying all of Lightfall was a mere Vex Simulation.

You know, Hive and Vex have always been my two favorite races and I think I now know why. Hive embody the grotesque, bodily horror which makes the stomach churn. But vex are the intellectual, existential horror which fills ones mind with an overwhelming sense of hopelessness. How truly terrifying. I adore it.

16:41 "I wish I'd taken that job at Clovis" Trust me pal, no you don't.

Simulations might be a neat twist to tie into an activity. Like how racing games have "ghost cars" in time trial modes, maybe we could have an activity where we have to beat our "simulation" to prove we're the real copy and "succeed" at the activity

It’s so cool that Byf unvaulted season of the undying for this video

I’m glad I can still watch Byf inside this Vex Simulation.

WE ALL need a TSLAYP of Helldivers 2

A theory: That Vex, running the simulations, was focused on running as many accurate sims as possible. The best of it's mind's ability. Keep the humans, human. So when or if the humans were released into Vex space, by other Vex or a Warmind, they could operate on the understanding of that sim. That the only thing that Vex did to play God was to give them the reason to go back into Vex space. It played the odds on them, and, in a way that allowed them to diverge in an expected and streamline manner. Reality was the Control Group. That Vex wanted honest humans, ones with knowledge of the Vex's potential abilities, and, those 227, humans to be willing to cross back into Vex controlled simulation. That was the experiment. To inject divergence and study the humans further into or onto Vex predictions. To any end deemed worth simulating. To seed them with the idea that they are tied to Vex consciousness, dead or worse without them. Possibly even to develop reflective data on the Vex themselves, to see what they don't have, or don't think. The Vex wanted a better perspective on human data.

That bulldozer ferrari analogy is really good, it very well demonstrates how near impossible a task it is, but given enough control over the circumstances, it is possible. like the few instances where the vex HAVE managed to simulate control over guardians, like saint 14 or the VoG fireteam, where the vex were given possibly hundreds of years in their turf.

“For the mind of the vex… is that faith?” -Praydeth, during the exotic version of the taken war paradox mission for no time to explain. The Vex simulate a draw for paracasual power. To place our hearts in the hands of the enemy and ask, “change your ways.” Ulan Tan and the truest truth. That we will not win or lose, but have a draw.

Joke is on us. We're in a vex simulation about watching a video about a video game in which the vex simulated a group of scientists

Another day another win for the Vex taking down the sweats the imposters among us

Haha, silly Byf. Of course the world is real. I'm watching this video on my phone with a charger. I even got my hand on Praedyth's shoulder. Wait... *NO-(Lost in time)*

"What is real? How do you define 'real'? If you're talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then 'real' is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain."

Honestly never knew why Grimore cards lore was never put on the loading screens in D1 even randomly, reading wtf was going on was interesting.

Good: "I think therefore I am." Better: "I can raise my middle finger at the Vex, therefore it doesn't matter if I'm in a simulation or not."

Here’s a 5th grade English class idea lol. The vex simulation started right after everyone’s lights went out in the Collapse. Mostly everyone died and those that are left are dealing with the vex the best they can. Our guardian is basically Neo from the Matrix unless you chose Exo for your starting class lol.

I guess the Vex Simulation had a glitch when we had that wacky weekend of wepon forging madness

Modern theories by people far smarter than myself put the probability that we are currently living in a simulation at roughly 25%. The real world, not just Destiny 2. I'd believe it if at the end of Final Shape we realize the Vex have won this whole time and we've just been fighting our way through a simulation.

I like to imagine that whenever a Vex Mind, no matter how big or small it is, that it could be simulating an individual that it doesn't yet know is a paracausal being like a Guardian. Then whenever it thinks it has it perfectly copied, it casts it's super or some other ability, the Vex Mind just spontaneously explodes. Then other Minds see that Mind and try to simulate what could've made that happen and then they also explode as well. So whenever you're fighting the Vex and you cast your super or any of your abilities, you're actually destroying a lot more vex than the ones you killed right in front of you.

I'm a bit surprised that Byf did not bring up Roko's Basilisk. It silly thought experiment (basically rapture for tech geeks) but it's suitable here.

The problem is that it's not like them simulating us just automatically sucks us into that simulation. There's a very real danger that their ability to accurately predict the future poses, strategically speaking, but that simulation itself is not an immediate danger to those of us outside of it. Sure it sucks a lot for the simulated versions of us that are basically spawned trapped, but we ourselves are not trapped. Unless, of course, it also *retroactively* simulates everyone's lives up until that point. In which case, the danger is very *very* real.

You forget Byf, Rasputin is now a robot dog! As such, he would obviously save people.....as he has become a very good boy.

I'll be honest, if I was in that situation, I'd be the nihilist of the group like, "Let's just go on with our lives, so what if we're a simulation, for all any of us know we've been simulations our whole existence, what difference does it make, and if it can hurt us so what, assuming there even is a real version of any of us, they won't suffer anything, our existence is irrelevant" For anyone thinking "You would be way more freaked if you were ACTUALLY in that situation" I disagree, I've been in a car accident where we were rolling to a bridge that was high enough to be certain death, I had a moment where time slowed and a fraction of a second lasted several minutes, in those minutes I accepted death, it was actually nice, fearing death is overrated, but clearly we didn't reach the bridge and actually survived without a scratch, I've been living with the acceptance of death for half my life by now and it was the best thing that's ever happened to me.

I truly hope that the next saga after light and darkness would have us dealing with the Vex and their timeline warping shenanigans

I really would love Vex Offensive to come back! I also love these deeper-lore ideas. Makes me appreciate the game even more.

I've never played The Sims, but some of those things you described... well, they bring back fond Rollercoaster Tycoon memories.

Really hope the simulated Ishtar researchers are part of Echoes. Their story is too good not to capitalize on. Yet…I would be concerned given Lightfall of how it could be handled.

Huh, if you think about it, we as the players are the Vex, we attempt to simulate the guardians every time we load into an activity or patrol we try and do something slightly different from every time before. We are always in groups with different people resulting in different outcomes. But we can only ever simulate 1 guardians actions at a time

"How do you know all of the things around you are real?" Why do you bring me back to my time reading Phillip K. Dick?

I feel like ever since Foresaken we've gotten further and further from our SciFi fantasy setting and ended up in a Fantasy scifi. Which the swapping of those adjectives is actually important to my point. Also how did you know I was watching those on a phone Byf? Very sus there Mr.Vex!

I would love another vex season

Ahamkara are real therefore the reality I reside in is real. Vex can't simulate paracausal or ontological effects, which Ahamkara create.

Been using this lore book for one of my Vex players in a Destiny 5e campaign. Awesome to see you cover it!

As a philosophy student, gotta love Descartes' name and epistemological thought drop. The philosophical weight of their lore is also almost certainly why the Hive and Vex are my favorite enemy races.

This reminds me of the most interesting (and my most favorite) vanilla Destiny 2 adventure on Nessus. It focused on the vex and our ghost told us that the vex had told him (our ghost) to "come home". This has huge implications.

Awesome video, topics like this show the hidden gems of the Destiny lore that isn’t fully covered in seasonal story.

Yk bif, I have a long running theory that bungies blunders are just a big vex sim.

I do wonder, with the 227 successfully rescued. Was that all of them? If the specimen was aware of it's capture, did it delete any and all of the simulations that didn't simulate the specimen being found? A defense mechanism of sorts so we would not see any advancement with their studies of us.

I kinda wanna see the vex be able to break the 4th wall and honestly bungie going full matrix with vex simulations that could be so interesting

I know im not a simulation cause who TF would wanna simulate me.

I am a zombie with infinite lives, and you want me to feel fear? You fundamentally misunderstand what we are. We are an unending army. Dying forever, and never at the same time.

Imagine if Destiny 1&2 didn’t use lore entries to tell their story Obviously that would be monumental but man Byf and his story telling, willingness to compile these videos is the sole reason I came back to Destiny after Beyond Light

I've always had this theory that if we have a computer that can perfectly stimulate reality, that same computer would need have enough power to simulate itself, simulating itself simulating a reality that would be simulating itself, simulating a reality, etc. Is it possible? Unsure. Maybe with each iteration the bubble that it can simulate shrinks, but then that's when you realize that its a simulation.

If the Vex ever figure out how to simulate us, we will have quite the fight on our hands

love this old D1 footage of byf using only raze lighter lol

The moment when you realise that Bungie likes to make terrifying-on-a-cosmic-scale enemies for us to fight... (The Vex and the Flood that I'm aware of but idk if there's also some in marathon)

existential horror my beloved

I don't play Destiny. I don't really engage with its community. But I can appreciate the effort put into making these videos, filtering through all the lore tidbits, and going to the supreme effort of collaborating with others to create something beyond the original source material. Awesome as always.

Vex simulated guardians in future expansion?!?!?!

I would honestly listen to a audio book on destiny lore from byf

The vex, to me, are the scariest of all the enemies of destiny. If you think hard about what they can do it’s scary

Byf cutting to "but that's all from me for now!" after dropping a unique kind of existential horror ending with "we're all probably doomed no matter what at that point" gave me psychological whiplash and I will be billing Bungie for my therapy appointment.

I'm enjoying all the contents but I'm missing out on the older lore videos due to no closed captions 😔 will there be CC on them at some point?

I don't know about us, but the guardians _are_ simulated. The fourth wall is canon in Destiny, and certain figures like Savathun, the Ahamkara, and the IX can poke at it. I guess in a way, the Vex can't predict the guardians because they aren't run by the CPU; they're run by us. Ask any IT guy about P.I.C.K. errors. I find it interesting that one of the scientists kept saying he should have gone to Braytech instead. He'd still be studying Vex, just from the hardware/biogoo angle instead of their mind/software.

When I was watching, I also thought that they could’ve possibly moved the specimen within range of the traveler, and because I can’t simulate the traveler it would just short circuit and shut down or something akin to that

Wish we'd get ti explore this more, but last we've had was the infinite forest(where it seems not just simulated vex can become aware). We kinda had some hints of it in neomuna with how the vex are active there, but not to this extent for a long while. Wish wed get more since vex can fight the hive on even footing(until they bring in Taken or paracausal shenanigans)

Great video

hi byf you should make a podcast about the lore and ill listen to it u can start from the beginning till now

Great i needed an existential crisis before going to bed thanks Byf

When asked the question of how do I know if I'm real, I like to refer to truth to power from your videos, that our reality is our reality and it's real to us and thats what matters because there isn't another reality we can realize.

I feel like the Vex are too abstractly horrifying for most people to fully grasp what itd be like to deal with then. I've seen countless people try to compare the Vex to the Flood from Halo, but there's just no comparison between these things. Don't get me wrong, i think the Flood are terrifying and Im nostalgic as hell for Halo. But the Flood rely on organic nervous systems to infect, where as the Vex casually infect all forms of matter, living or otherwise. The Flood have the Logic Plague, but the Vex aren't sentient in the same way AI are, and their Pattern is simply more fundamental than anything that the Gravemind could come up with. Especially since there's no reason it couldn't be outright simulated by the Vex, or be converted in the time its trying to corrupt some Vex units. Even neural physics, in my mind at least, would be largely comparable to the texh the Vex have access to considering they can manipulate time, the gate systems, instant transimission, access to the greater vex network linked across time and space, etc.

And now an interesting consideration: Comments from a D2 vanilla strike by our Ghost, asking about OXA and MSund12. Did Maya Sundaresh fork-12 make it, somehow, through the Vex network and find the OXA, or a simulation of the OXA device?

.....welp, I'm now questioning my own existence even more than usual. Thanks, Byf.

This is why guardian fireteams always have multiple classes as part of the team. When the Warlock starts thinking too much, either the Hunter does something stupid or the Titan punches something.

Still wish we get a master vex that acts as a mastermind for the vex. Something older than Quria

Off topic but also on topic, with bungie recently having some layoff as of late it goes without say that there should've been new job openings... that being said.. bungie needs to hire this man so we can have our very own personal byf reading to us grimeore lore, journal entries etc IN GAME ! It would also help with the add multi task of listing to the lore of some exotic weapon or armor while I take on a horde of enemies 😉

4:17 Bruh I'm watching this on my PC because my phone needed to charge.

I like to think that maybe after the Light and Dark saga, The Witness or someone else has set up some kind of dead man's switch to enable the Vex to simulate paracausality. It wouldn't be entirely out of left field, given the previous existence of the black heart and Asher's manual simulation of the Veil.

Love the story and the lore

Just like the question within the Ishtar Collective, how do we know if we are on the right timeline? Are we on the one that Panoptes predicted?

Ive been in love with everything vex since 2014. They are so damn cool, and my favorite enimies in the game.

Maybe I’m being dense but whenever I see stuff about the Vex simulations I always think “so what?” until they can simulate guardians, it just doesn’t really matter

The vex are decently the coolest race in my opinion. When you get to know the lore they all of a sudden shift from generic si-fi robot to much more lifelike. I would love a new season where we find some damaged vex and make a deal with it. That would just be so weird and so sick.

This reminds me of the story of I Have No Mouth But I Must Scream, especially when the narrator meets AM, idk why though.

Interesting and scary theory, but this all calls back to what happens post the Beyond Light with the Exo Stranger and even further back with Season of the Dawn.

Huh, I just worked out something - these sims are probably how Ishtar worked out how to build their own Exo's that didn't need access to the alkahest to prevent billboarding.

The vex are weird bc they can time travel but they can’t but they can but they can’t but they can. The echo chamber did what it could with setting up the rules on how the vex CAN time travel and besides some great predictions like the endless night the super vex computer hasn’t really been a big threat.

I wasn't ready for D1 gameplay

I have always felt that the Vex and the Borg have so much in common.

The Vex are so underutilized 😭

Byf casually causing his subscribers to question existence and everything we've known

04:31 Byf becomes Morpheus 😂

It's unfortunate how it doesn't feel like the Vex don't get as much screen-time as the other species. Sure, Lightfall had a focus of sorts, but the last main conflict we had with with the Vex was during Season of the Splicer if I'm not mistaken... (Well, that's what I get for not playing through Season of the Wish yet; seems like the Sol Divisive are the fore-front of this season...)

The one line of “If you have a plan, then so does your sim, and the Vex knows about it” Almost makes the Vex omniscient if they have a good enough simulation

On the note of Rasputin coming back and being a threat to the Vex, Could Rasputin be revived by a ghost and become a guardian? I understand he had somewhat of an exo form and we have exo guardians but Rasputin wasn't a living thing so could he be revived as a guardian in the same way our guardian was? Love the video! :D

I feel like post witness we will get a big storyline featuring the vex. But I’ve been out of the destiny community and lore circles for almost a year so I’m not sure if anything had been hinted.

What would be truly terrifying though is if this entire story from D1 all the way through to Final Shape was just one gigantic Vex simulation, that something happens during or after Final Shape that served to pull away the current and have us realize we've been in a glass box this entire time under the Vex's control (though that might cheapen everything that has transpired as never having happened in "reality").

Is Tslayp available on Patreon?

You've just described humanities entire existence....we are sims

All these simulation fears are ruled out by the fact that the Vex don’t know said persons most intimate thoughts and memories.

Thanks!

God i wanna have an uncensored version of this lore read

i wish we had a series for this universe

Damn. I am now questioning reality

I didn’t do my homework cause Byf convinced me I’m in a simulation.

Thanks for describing the average vex daily routine

It's kinda scary, getting told that the phone im watching yt on might not be real, Byf not knowing what device I'm using while watching

Its a shame Bungie has about given up on doing anything with the Vex. I remember Drifter telling us the Vex we've been fighting were their equivalent of a scouting party and that we haven't met their warforms yet. God, I wish we could, they are so cool

briefly, after curse of osiris, i was wondering if everything was still all just a vex simulation and if they were going to do anything with that potential