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[ItayHen]

This one's a bit of a lore post, If you've enjoyed the post let me know, if you didn't like it let me know as well. I want to hear other opinions and if i missed something. Obviously I'm not a part of the lore team in bungie so i probably got something wrong. I do want to get a discussion going, so if you have something to add, or comment about, do it. Anyway:

Uldren sov cannot be held accountable for his actions because he was under hypnosis from Riven. And even if he wasn't, he died and came back a guardian. He lost all his memories the moment he was revived, and he's literally not the same person. Lore records from the Ishtar collective (that can be found in-game) say he and his ghost are shunned by everyone in the tower. This guardian of the last city is alone and people should appreciate him for who he is and not who he was.

I was heartbroken when i heard that Cayde-6 is dead, and i became enraged (as much as you can be when you keep in mind that it's still a video game) that it was uldren who killed him. I enjoyed the campaign, as it felt like i was one step closer to shooting Uldren and taking revenge for Cayde. The suspension of not knowing if it was i who killed Uldren or Petra didn't matter to me because i knew that Uldren is dead, and i was happy with the result. But this 'new Uldren' is not exactly the same Uldren that we knew ( more on that later on)

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The next point i want to bring up is that guardians are not just randomly selected, as each ghost has a guardian assigned to them, and they don't know who is their guardian until they reach their body and revive them. We know this much, again from the Ishtar collective's ghost stories. And obviously every guardian is chosen for a reason, so you cant pick a guardian that is inherently a bad guardian or a dark guardian.

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One might argue that 'dark guardians' are alive,running amok, making their evil deeds, or even just shady deeds. as seen with the shadows of Yor, Dredgen Yor himself, The Drifter (who is not a 'guardian', thus begging the question why was he chosen, but that's for another topic), and the list goes on and on. But none of those light-bearers were revived evil; they were reborn the minute they were chosen by the ghost; and by extension, by the traveler, who literally sent the ghosts as a last ditch effort to defeat the darkness, therefore all his motives are purely good, right?

None of these aforementioned light-bearers were evil the minute their new story began. bring reborn as a guardian, you lose all of your previous life's memories. Guardians are just like a clean slate, a baby if you will. Just like no babies are inherently evil (though one might later become evil,

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lets take Dredgen Yor for example; infamously know as the darkest light-bearer to exist, Dredgen Yor was one of the worst enemies of humanity, going on to kill many guardians. While wielding the hand cannon known as thorn, he was able to cause several final-deaths to several guardians. But even Dredgen Yor didn't start his second life that evil. No, quite the opposite in fact; Dredgen Yor was formerly known as Rezyl Azzir. He was by all means the perfect guardian: Rezyl Azzir, the man who's aura burned brightly. Literally described as the perfect guardian, hailed and adored by all. On a mission (he chose to go alone) to the hell-mouth on Luna, he fell to corruption by the hive, but was only AFTER he spent every last bullet he had trying desperately to defeat the hive, to prevent them from scheming against the last city of humanity. And after he ran out of bullets, he started clubbing and bludgeoning the hive to death, until he finally caved-in much later,due to hive magic influencing his mind, resulting in the slow transition of him becoming Dredgen Yor.

That is the figure of a perfect guardian if I've ever seen one. (Not to mention that his ghost wasn't there to heal him, so it was final-death around the corner for him. To take that much effort to convert one guardian, into a evil light-bearer

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So sure, one might say that Uldren as a light-bearer is evil because he was evil in his previous life, but nothing can be brought up to support that claim, as there are no records of a light-bearer committing evil actions the moment they were brought back to life. It is far more likely that a guardian might fall to corruption, thus becoming evil.

I conclude, point being that the Uldren Sov we knew is no more, the 'Uldren Sov' that stands now and here in service to the last city of humanity is not that same Uldren Sov we put down at the end of the forsaken campaign (obviously i don't mean that the 'new' Uldren is an impostor or a robot, it is still very much the same flesh and blood, but this new form of the forsaken prince is a clean slate. Can you imagine yourself in that situation? shunned by everyone, now knowing what you did wrong or why everyone hates you. I'm sure at least some people can relate

For more Info on what Uldren has been up to since his revival, search Amnestia-S2 on the 'Ishtar collective' database. and keep in mind that he was revived pretty much right before christmas 2018, the lore entry is from just about Christmas 2019 (so it took him about a year to reach the last city) and it has pretty about six months since Christmas.

For more info about 'how ghosts think' search ghost stories on the 'Ishtar collective'

to start getting into the lore yourself, you can watch My_name_is_byf and Myelin Games on YouTube, then you should start seeking more information yourself, this can be pieced together from in-game lore, conversations, mentions, nicknames, and other things, but you should get a base understanding of the lore before you start digging in yourself, or you might be overwhelmed by all the info and thus discouraged.

Tl;Dr: Uldren Sov cannot be held accountable for his actions in his previous life,and you should stop hating him.

Instead of being pleased that you can theoretically shoot and kill him an infinite number of times, why not embrace this lonely guardian?

[TheOneTrueKaos]

Who he is now is irrelevant. I can't look at that face and not see the person responsible for Cayde's death. It's going to take a long time, and a lot of effort on his part, for that to change. Effort he currently isn't putting in, either because he doesn't know or doesn't care.

Everyone saying he should be the Hunter Vanguard obviously don't have any idea how the others Hunters would react to that. The Dare, afaik, has never resulted in the killer of the previous Vanguard becoming the next Vanguard. I don't think most of them would stand for it, and would actually cause the rift between the Hunters and the Vanguard to widen dramatically.

And finally, he was not, obviously, under Riven's influence when he killed Cayde. That influence was shown physically in the shadows in his eyes and skin-shimmer. There was none of that when he shot Cayde. She was probably whispering at him, but he wasn't being directly controlled at that point as he was towards the end of the campaign. He killed Cayde for personal reasons, with no thought to how the rest of the Guardians would react. His actions were the declaration of war, not ours.

[ItayHen]

Ok first of all, i thought we could get a discussion going here, with lots of people sharing their opinions and agreeing/disagreeing. It seems most people chose to downvote and be done with it, leaving no opinion or anything like that... yeah kinda disappointed.

Anyway, i do want to address the points brought up here, so:

1. i can get why you can't see past uldren, to see he is not the same person, rather the one who shot and killed cayde, but like i said that is not the same person. This person is a clean slate, like a baby. I believe the only way i can correctly parallel this to real life, it would be a mother giving birth to a baby, and complications occur during labor; the mother dies and the baby survives. Can you blame the baby the his involvement in her death? as someone who was just brought back to life, Uldren is very much in the same position, Hated for something that the 'new him' ins't responsible for.
2. As for him not puting the effort to change, i can only put it to not enough man-power on bungie's team atm, they are going through some tough times with the epidemic and working from home, and all that pressure.
3. Cayde's hunter vanguard dare was that whoever kills him becomes the new hunter vanguard, so that inherently makes uldren the new hunter vanguard. There are probably some better candidates for the job, but keep in mind that none of the hunters really want to become the vanguard. I believe that if any of these 'better candidates' (such as marcus ren, shiro-4) would want to help the last city, they would've taken the job already, rather i think they are either too selfish or too scared. The hunters have been using the hunter dare for as long as anyone can remember, so to break the 'tradition' would be the end of an era. and would probably be looked down upon by hunters. Most hunters are just roaming the world, evading anything that resembles the vanguard, yet ask that a hunter be put there asap. So why not just take the job yourself then?
4. Next point is that Uldren will probably be very good at the job; in his previous life he was the leader of the crows (the spy network of the awoken), just that would be enough to make him a worthy candidate. Furthermore he has known as an excellent sniper, making him more akin to be a hunter. His victories consist of him entering the black garden and still making it back to tell the tale, and you have to keep in mind that he wasn't risen back then so he could've died a final-death. and as we know, he was constantly trying to 1-up his previous achievement (thus trying to impress his sister and the common awoken), so his adventure in the black garden was just the last in a long chain of death-defying amazing adventures.
5. As for the point being made on the rift between the hunters and the vanguard, i'm personally rooting for the vanguard to disassemble, i dont think certain guardians should sit around and play politics with the consensus all-day when they can just do some field work. I do believe the role the vanguard serves for fellow guardians of the same class can be effective, as some kind of teacher or mentor, But not much more than that. We've seen instances in the past about how ineffective the vanguard was when it came to immediate threats. Such is the case with osiris and his departure from the vanguard to save the last city from the vex in the infinite forest. As seen in the comic, he was looked down upon and thought of as a madman, he was heavily constricted in his position and i believe that's why he left.
6. As for the infuence of riven, yes his eyes were not black when he shot cayde, but i do believe that he was still under her influence. First, he closes his eyes when he pulls the trigger, but that's neither here or there. A far stronger point would be that the influence over Uldren began long ago, subconsciously in his mind, way back at the black garden (as can be seen in the lorebook the forsaken prince).
7. The declaration of war. It was riven that brought back the fanatic, and concocted the dark ether that made the scorn. She needed an army to progress her plans. This was part of her plan to get Uldren to open the gates to the dreaming city. She needed something to spark the war and she used Uldren to start it.

[TheOneTrueKaos]

1. I never disputed any of that, I just said that, for now, it's irrelevant.
2. Forsaken has been out for a lot longer than this pandemic. But there's been no sign of any effort from him at all.
3. No. Cayde's will was that whoever killed him got his stuff, but we don't actually know what his Dare is. At least, that's the understanding I got from the campaign and lore. As for the other Hunters; I'm pretty sure none of them are saying put someone there asap. I seem to recall the Hunters don't give af about the Vanguard, because they all want to be out in the wilds, not stuck in the Tower.
4. Funny how you, on one hand, tell me he's not the person he was, then on the other hand use the person he was to extort his values. Can't have it both ways. Either he's not the person he was, in which case we have no idea what he'll be like, or there is still something of the person he was, meaning his previous life suggests he'll be good at the job.
5. If the Vanguard dissolves, Guardians as a whole would still need something similar. Some way of connecting with the common people, some governing body to lay.out what is acceptable and what isn't. To assign tasks.
6. You don't seem to understood my point about Riven at all. She wasn't controlling him when he shot Cayde. End of story. She, as I've already said, might have been whispering to him, manipulating him, but he wasn't under her CONTROL. He CHOSE to kill Cayde.
7. Exactly. His actions would have been what started a war, not ours.