Dive into a detailed comparison of two of the most terrifying infections in video games: Halo’s Flood and Dead Space’s Necromorphs. We’ll explore their origins, methods of propagation, combat tactics, and the galactic-scale devastation they cause. Uncover their strengths, weaknesses, and ultimate goals, and find out which of these nightmare forces would emerge victorious if they ever clashed.
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You missed the Key minds (not the ones from battlefields, the planet sized ones) which are the smarter version of gravemind. Also the flood doesn’t need a nervous system to infect you, stuff can be used as biomass if it doesn’t have a nervous system but is biological.
its an interesting theory but i thiiiiiiiiink the flood might take the cake in terms of being infectious
the necromorphs reanimate dead flesh
the flood can infect living AND dead flesh. so an infection form should be able to to infect a necromorph
and as a bonus i'd like to mention how incredibly stupid the forruners where
2:03 the forrunners realized if even a single flood spore survived, it could rebuild its entire army
forrunner: so we're gonna wipe out all life in the galaxy to stop them…..buuuuuuut i wanna keep some flood around in stasis for shits and giggles
Yayyyyyy
I think the grave mind or key mind would be overtaken by the marker. So the marker would then basically make it so the flood and the necromorphs are both agents of the marker
The flood would win the gravemind is too intelligent for the marker signal to drive it mad.
The flood doesn't really need live bodies just biomass necromorphs require bodily functions to stop as living tissue resists conversion
Another advantage is that the gravemind would immediately hack it causing it not work anymore which most of the necromorphs would die since it only relies on the minds of the markers
There’s are in fact multiple graveminds everywhere in the galaxy
"And in conclusion…it could go either way"
Jk. Great video by the way!
They're radically different in purpose and usage within a fictional setting; Necromorphs are meant to be terrifying, while the Flood are meant to be a plot device.
The flood definitely win this one, once they reach the interstellar stage and eventually the transgalactic stage they begin making reality their toy via neural physics, given how the flood retains every bit of knowledge it has ever assimilated from the time it first came into existence and even interstellar structures called star roads spanning galaxies created by the precursors were repurposed into weapons against the forerunners during the forerunner-flood war, the flood has even mastered the art of mental manipulation given its ability to use logic plagues to drive living beings and even AIs to side with it or to torture them into submission, so the marker's influence would at best annoy or possibly entertain a gravemind but would do nothing to the collective flood as a whole beyond possibly reanimate bodies the flood had yet to fully infect but inevitably the flood would pick the necromorphs apart, the flood is just too damn intelligent and versatile once it reaches the coordinated stage so anything beyond that starts to become overkill.
I’ve thought of a way these two infections could work together.
Precursor dust is used to construct a marker. It’s effects in the material alter it’s functions, infecting people with spores, making them flood first, and if they sustain enough damage and die, THEN they become necromorphs. A two phase infection that blends the Floods abilities, including neural physics that might alter the visions people see that trigger convergence not by homicidal thought, but just by gathering around the marker to receive the spores to spread, before the marker is turned on, and the flood infection takes hold, using the intelligence gathered to coordinate infected to build a gravemind to build upon the marker’s functions.
You're forgetting the possibility where the merge form something we else. The flood is directly stated to be able to consume biomass in order to function and repair their various forms. The pure flood forms for instance we re literally just living creatures turned it raw biomass for the flood to manipulate. And you don't need to be alive in order to be infected, they are just as capable of infecting the dead as they are the living. The necromorphs have proven to be unable to infect living beings except under specific circumstances like laboratory experimentation. I believe personally that they would infect each other and eventually evolve into something new. A new species that has the combined strengths and weaknesses of the flood and the necromorphs.
I remember testing this in Garry's Mod.
The Necromorph's had better verity from Slashers, Pukers, Brutes and Exploders, but the Flood replenished their numbers much faster than the Necromorphs with most of their units being able to use guns. Assault Rifles, Rocket Launchers, Plasma Rifles and Laser Cutters. this gave the Necros a very hard time because their units were being gunned down before they could get close enough with Flood Spores then consuming the dead Necros turning them into more Flood. while the Necros had Hunters that kept regenerating, the Flood still had spores swarming the fields to reanimate the dead. unless the bodies were in complete pieces, the Flood kept resurrecting. the Necros were resurrecting too but nowhere near as fast as the Flood.
Yeah, I have to give this to the Flood. most of them being able to use guns and revive themselves faster made it too difficult for the Necros to keep up.
Nah necromorphs win with ease they are already dead it's not about strength it's just the fact they won't stop
Who ever wins, Humanity losses!
Okay flood use live and dead hosts also use any organic material available and at grave mind stage it's god god like knowledge if it reached galactic or planet size stage then your looseing
Would like a game where we got to play two alien factions like this in a large all out war
The flood would lose necromorphs are able to mess with minds and the flood are made of living beings still alive being used as mass but the minds are left intact the necromorphs use living and dead victims to make more and make a brother moon so the mass the flood collected would just be enough to make a moon
The necoros don't need infectors to spread the infection just being within the massive range of a marker is enough. It's also worth noting that the necromorph infection doesn't care what you are made of and even small amounts contacting non infected flesh would turn it team necro like the hunter or feeders while the flood needs you to be made of flood cells for crying out loud the necros don't even need a nervous system so infection forms wouldn't even work.
Basically being a necromorph is a description of any piece of biomass while the flood is more of a species. We know that necors can infect everything from plants to bacteria to animals while the best the flood can do is interface with a nervous system so there is literally no reason to think flood can infect a necro but all the reason to think that a necro can infect a flood.
I also want to add that the fight with the forerunners isn't really that impressive as they were just stupid. We right now have ways to counter the flood as they need to contact skin (or even more depending on the lore) and in the halo verse the much less advanced unsc can fight the flood and for the covenant a basic energy shield makes you impossible to infect. So the idea that the flood are these multiversal threat is stupid we get infected by the common cold right now and people die from it does that make the common cold stronger than all the worlds military's combined?
You can argue all day and night on if a necromorph or flood invasion is more dangerous but the necros counter the flood very well.
Two corpses in one grave
The flood dont strictly need a nervous system. They can make pure forms out of any repurposed biomass.
The flood have the added advantage of being able to use vehicles, weapons and the knowledge of their hosts.
They also have a higher infection rate, within hours they wouldve fully consumed earth.
I mean even if the flood could infect necromorphs and beat the necromorphs back, they still lost. You got to understand the marker had just an absurdity of corrupting. Literally it all started from something like the flood starts from biomass. The marker starts the necromorphs they make you psychotic they make you crazy. They brainwash you. They make you give you hallucinations thinking something's wrong. And then once you start killing and murdering enough people and slaughter yourself biomass instantly with no input starts corrupting itself into necromorphs. So even if the flood somehow stopped the necromorphs, the markers would just influence them
I've read a few threads about this and I've always said the same thing. They won't even entertain the idea of fighting each other. Want to know why? They are basically siblings. Brother and Sister. They are definitely teaming up
You have too much faith in the flood.
The flood could be stopped the markers cannot be stopped.
You forgot the flood needs the nervous system to be intact the necros do not. The marks can use dead flood but the flood can't use living or dead necros.
Even if the maker is broken a single piece is as powerful as the entire marker.
Plus the maker has got many to kill their own thinking they were necros so how do you know it can't do it against the flood especially before a hivemind is made.
I cant stand this What If scenario because its hard to incorporate all of their lore when it conflicts heavily with each other.
For example, in Halo the Precursors made Humanity and eventually became the Flood. And in Dead Space, the Black Markers specifically are responsible for the creation of sentient species, Humanity being one of them. So that pary there already messes up the What If scenario.
I do have to point out, the whole hallucinating effects the Marker induces only works because the marker has access to the human blueprint in a way, and can pick out what chemicals and nerves in our bodies to trigger the right reactions, and to cause mass casualties amongst a massive population to stack more bodies, if the Marker's influence was in a heavily militarized area like Halo, the Necromorphs would definitely have gun using forms.
In a mind of a stellaris player, this is a devouring swarm versus a devouring swarm.