Daybreak Reference Manual

Project Daybreak may come across as frighteningly complex and inaccessible to someone coming from the outside. This page serves as a basic introduction to its divergences from 343i canon, as well as serving as a guide for those potentially interested in contributing to the setting. For a more detailed look at what the project regards as canon, see Canon Policy.

Introduction
Project Daybreak is a synthesis of various ideas by different people and has no single origin point. Its concepts and themes have been shaped by close to ten years of online discussions about Halo's fiction, coupled with numerous headcanons and fanon ideas. Early on, much of the fiction developed for the project was definitely a reaction to 343i's Halo, though some of its ideas date back to before 343i was even a thing. More than anything, the early Daybreak fiction was driven by a desire to put into concrete terms what we had been criticizing about the official version of the post-war narrative, by providing an alternate "what could have been" scenario based on our notions of how the Halo universe worked. It has taken several years for the project to grow beyond that and find its own identity. The rebellious streak of the early days has given way for a more nuanced perspective, incorporating the lessons we learned from 343i while making our own lore into something that could stand on its own legs.

For all intents and purposes, Project Daybreak's timeline and universe-building diverge from 343i's canon after the release of Halo 3: ODST in 2009. Everything released after that game is, to borrow a Star Wars term, "Legends"; some of it will make it in, sometimes unchanged, but by default don't assume it to be there. This applies equally to post-war, war-era and background lore content. We ask you to transport yourself to a 2009-era headspace, when all the possibilities for the post-war era were still totally open, and when much of Halo's setting itself hadn't yet been defined. In a way, we're taking on the role of 343i as they set out to expand Halo's universe beyond the Covenant War, just with some different goals and with the hindsight of the last 10+ years of Halo canon to look back on to see what works and what doesn't. This clean-slate approach helps us separate the chaff from the wheat and clean up a lot of the dead weight the universe has collected over the years. By going back to the basics, we aim to see what really matters and then build on top of that as a foundation.

Project Daybreak retools Halo's post-Covenant War era, with a thematic focus on the political and social repercussions of the war on both humanity and the ex-Covenant cultures, rather than the Forerunners or the Reclamation. We've also extended the timeline of the post-war reconstruction period from about five years to three decades before the next tentpole event. This also means that the UNSC's recovery and the Covenant's splintering happen at a more gradual pace. The UNSC thus remains the setting's underdogs for the time being, even as some technological advances in the post-war decades begin to bring them closer to the level of post-Covenant polities; eventually, they'll become a small but formidable polity on the local level. There is more weight put to the consequences of the war, and the transition from the end of the war to the post-war era is less stark; for example, there is no Infinity or Spartan-IVs to miraculously solve the UNSC's problems. This means the UNSC will have to do more with less, and politicking with the ex-Covenant in particular will have to assume a larger role. On the Covenant side, our goal is to increase the post-Covenant factions' narrative presence in a way that befits their empire's implied size, as well as give them agency equal to that of the UNSC. The Covenant empire has also been populated with more detail and definition; while it was always implicit that their empire was ancient and massive, this rarely translated well to their presentation in the post-war narrative.

We also focus on aspects of the worldbuilding often neglected in the fanon, including society and culture, religion, and astrography, to create the impression of a vast and lived-in galaxy. Another key goal of the project has been to re-establish or further define constraints and rules which had been effectively erased in the official universe, or never been there in the first place. Rather than ignoring the unique idiosyncrasies of astronomical distances and travel times, superluminal communications, logistics and the societal effects of long-term space travel, we have wholly embraced such factors as the fundamental scaffolding around which Daybreak's setting and metanarrative are constructed.

Currently, the main focus of Daybreak is on the reconstruction period from 2552 to 2580, dealing with the complexities of inter-species and inter-civilizational cooperation and conflict in a time of tumult and uncertainty. The goal is to truly explore what the Human-Covenant War and the Great Schism mean for these civilizations and characters; how is humanity impacted by this devastating first contact, and how the post-Covenant come to grips with their crisis of faith. Material further along the timeline is planned, but not yet fully defined. The project is also not exclusively about the post-war era, and considerable attention has been given to the universe's backstory on both the human and Covenant sides, all the way to the foundations of both the Covenant and the UNSC and more.

The following list aims to detail the most notable deviations from the official canon (along with explanations as to why) while also making some notes about in-setting trends or themes that may be of interest. And, of course, it assumes you have a more than basic familiarity with Halo fiction up to the present day. (If you stopped consuming Halo fiction after 2009, Daybreak may actually be less confusing to you.) While we try to stick to defining Daybreak on its own terms, comparisons will inevitably be drawn to 343i's lore in the following. This is to provide context for our decisions as well as make our deviations clear, and should not be understood as an attempt at point-by-point one-upsmanship or refutation of 343i's version of the canon. It's just that sometimes it takes knowing what you don't want something to be to know the opposite.

Themes, style and presentation
These are general notes that might help conceptualize Project Daybreak's version of the Halo setting in one's head, especially for those considering contributing. Many of the things said here may be obvious depending on where you're coming from, but we saw fit to describe them anyway for the sake of having some semblance of a unified vision. With that being said, there is room for tonal and stylistic variety in individual stories. This is just to provide a general idea of universe-level themes for the sake of a unified vision.

Creatively, Project Daybreak's goal is to be faithful to the "spirit" of Halo but also be innovative in expanding the universe. Bungie set out to make games, 343i set out to create a franchise, and we aim to build a mythology. Moreover, creatively speaking, 343i's goal early on was, in their own words, to "radically reinvent Halo with a very different perspective". Ours is to expand from where Bungie and MS' Franchise Development Group left off; boldly going to new places, but keeping the core intact. You can never get the same vision with different people in charge, and that would be creatively pointless anyway. But we are trying to make sure our vision is compatible with and respects what came before. "Emotional equity" is a term Marty O'Donnell uses in regards to fitting his music and sound design with the games, and it's something we also try to do with our material and Halo overall. It's not just about getting all the details and lore right, it's also about catching a mood, an atmosphere, and a tone. Things shouldn't repeat, but they should rhyme.

While Daybreak is a project by fans and decidedly borne out of passion for the source material, we also try not to think of it as a fan service project. Namely, it would be pointless to wipe a large chunk of official canon clean only to make similar mistakes again. To avoid this, we are trying to be mindful of the traps fan projects often fall into; being married to the status quo, overindulging in fan service and references, or lacking overarching vision being among them. Canon is ultimately an illusory structure, but it is nonetheless useful for establishing both a common framework, and boundaries for what one can and can't do. While we are ignoring a large chunk of official canon in favor of establishing our own, we also seek to avoid the pitfalls of canon-negligent fan fiction by making our own rules even more robust than those of the original canon. Part of this is exercising restraint; there can be too much of a good thing, and just because you can do something (let's say make infinite Spartan-IIs) doesn't mean you should. Just like the sandbox of the original Halo has absolutely nothing that doesn't need to be there, so do we too seek to exercise frugality in introducing narratively-relevant elements. We have sought to be skeptical of everything, being unafraid to re-examine and reinterpret fixtures of the universe when needed, while avoiding change for change's sake. Additions, omissions or expansions should be done with care, avoiding the most surface-level interpretations. If something is altered, it should be done to make the overall universe richer and more cohesive. Some changes also happen naturally because of the butterfly effects of our narrative changes as well as Daybreak's more clearly-defined foundational rules, such as slipspace travel speeds and astronomical scales.

With all that being said, Daybreak is not a "Bungie good, 343i bad" spite project, just a different take on the setting by some passionate fans who have maybe in many ways outgrown what the canon universe has become. Reinterpretations of beloved works can get stuck in an intertextual feedback loop, continually commenting on what came before and at times deconstructing it. We are not here to reflect on 343i's fiction, but rather establish our own. This also means that we try to avoid referencing some of 343i's ideas only to point out the flaws in them. Deconstruction can only get you so far, because it's still fundamentally bound to the work being deconstructed. Rather, think of Daybreak as a reconstruction, something that rises above mere spite.

For inspiration, we lean quite a bit on Halo's origins and even pre-Halo Bungie mythos; that, and the sci-fi literature and films that served as their inspiration in turn. We want to bring back into the fabric of the setting the sci-fi sense of wonder and scale that was there in Halo CE; the sense of being confronted with something you don't fully understand, as well as the idea that there's always something more going on beyond the relatively narrow snapshot of the world that we see. This means that not everything has to be explicit, and some parts of the setting, particularly its deep history, can safely be allowed to remain a mystery. As J.R.R. Tolkien put it (in reference to The Lord of the Rings), "Part of the attraction of The L.R. is, I think, due to the glimpses of a large history in the background: an attraction like that of viewing far off an unvisited island, or seeing the towers of a distant city gleaming in a sunlit mist. To go there is to destroy the magic, unless new unattainable vistas are again revealed."

In terms of style and tone, Daybreak's universe-building leans largely on the classic Halo games and novels. While the setting is morally gray and fairly grim at times, the protagonists' actions can have positive effects on it as a whole, though their victories are often hard-won with sacrifices. Though the protagonists are often as flawed as the world they inhabit, their actions tend to be more net beneficial than not. And however grim things get, there is yet hope that the actions of such flawed but ultimately well-meaning individuals can turn the course of history for the better. Moreover, there is the notion that actions and events in general have consequences, for better or for worse. Though conflict itself persists as a constant, the narrative moves on and the sources of conflict change. As such, the post-war era generally assumes a more hopeful tone than the war, with the intent of genuinely taking the universe forward while still maintaining a believable level of tension and conflict in a way that arises naturally from the history of the setting so far. This means avoiding comic book- or soap opera-style storytelling, which is ultimately cyclical in nature and in service of an unchanging status quo dictated by the medium. For us, if we need to shake things up, they get shaken up good. We are trying to consciously avoid introducing threats just because the protagonists need something to shoot at, or escalating the stakes for the sake of escalation; when the gun is pointed at the head of the universe, it should have impact, and you can't have that if it happens every other Tuesday.

We try to construct a dynamic setting that is always in flux, with events that have consequences. A lot of fictional societies tend to be pretty stagnant and static, and Halo also suffers from this. Especially when it comes to the Covenant's 3400-year history, we've tried to bring more variety and development in culture, society and technology; this inevitability of change also applies when it comes to the collision of the human and Covenant societies after the war. There is also an emphasis on how technologies affect society and governance, rather than the two existing in isolation. For example, FTL communicators and faster slipspace drives enable smoother contact with faraway worlds, which can change the power dynamics of entire civilizations. On that same note, we've tried to bring out nuances and variety within otherwise monolithic-seeming institutions and cultures, particularly within the Covenant but also humanity, especially in regards to colonial polities. Factions are not merely built to be viewed through the crosshairs of the main characters, but are allowed to have a fully-realized independent existence.

Our approach is a balancing act between making the setting deeper, richer and more layered, while still fully embracing Halo's style, tone and signature aesthetic — in short, the things that make it "Halo". This means we're not attempting to "fix" things as much as we're expanding on them and at times recontextualizing them. For example, we're not going to turn the Scorpion to be more like the M1 Abrams or the Warthog to be like a Humvee because Halo isn't a milsim universe or even a "realistic" extrapolation of what future warfare will probably be like. A quote attributed to Robt McLees goes something like this: "About 200 years from now we got to the point where weapon is just a glass of water; you drink it and all your enemies die. Then we went back to the cool stuff." This doesn't mean we have to abandon all semblance of realism, but it does mean paying attention to the philosophy and influences that gave rise to core parts of the universe. More than "fixing" the setting, Daybreak is about finding plausible in-universe explanations for why things are the way they are. In many cases, this actually provides interesting ways to expand on technological progress: for example, in Daybreak, early and pre-UNSC ships had more realistic traits such as skyscraper-style deck layouts and conspicuous heat radiator panels, which gradually gave way to the UNSC aesthetic we know as technology improved.

When it comes to contradictions within the original canon, implicit or explicit, we try to resolve them by going with the interpretation that makes most sense with the whole. One example of this are few star locations we've changed, as well as some of the more absurd figures given in the Nylund novels for accelerations or velocities. Such "retcons" are deemed acceptable, as long as they have no real effect on the narrative or presentation; a different thing entirely would be to alter major character motivations, story beats or dynamics between major factions (e.g. suddenly turning the UNSC into the top dogs of the setting after the Human-Covenant War). Whatever their scope, changes should always be made deliberately and with solid justification, for the ultimate purpose of better supporting the internal dynamics of the setting. For example, the location of the Kig-Yar home system of Y'Deio is changed as the original location would place it well within the heartlands of the Human Sphere. Another such change is our retooled history of the Jiralhanae, which was done to make them more formidable as a threat as well as credible rivals to the Sangheili.

It should also be noted that Daybreak's tone is quite anti-HFY. Note that this does not mean we cannot celebrate human achievement or have humans pull off extraordinary feats in the face of equally extraordinary threats; much of Halo's most memorable narrative moments take the form of the latter. It's just about going overboard with self-glorification. It also doesn't mean that individual characters in-setting cannot have HFY-oriented views; the overarching narrative just doesn't share those views.

Aesthetics and design
Daybreak's aesthetic style takes after the project's overall theme of going back to the basics and then building on top of them. This means our visual style should be seen as a clear continuity from the original game trilogy's design direction. There is no stark transition from "war era" to "post-war era" in aesthetics and technology like in 343i's canon; designs from Halos CE-3 remain in use for years, even decades onward, only to be gradually added on and supplanted. It should also be noted that, though a "definitive" version of Daybreak's visuals can be assumed to exist, visual canon is always subject to the ambiguities inherent to creative interpretation.

Astronomy and locations
Astrography and locality play a large role in Daybreak in order to create a sense of scale as well as a compelling overarching structure upon which to superimpose stories. Factions and events don't merely exist somewhere out in space, they're tied to a location, and that locality influences how they interact with other factions and events due to the limitations on slipspace travel and communication speeds, as well as the availability of travel and communications.


 * Our general approach to mapping the galaxy is a principle the could be described as "enhanced reality": while heavily informed by real-life astrography, Daybreak also adds systems and astronomical features that aren't necessarily there in the real world, at least as far as we can currently detect. As well, as our knowledge of Earth's interstellar neighborhood increases, some of the information will likely become obsolete; even within the twenty years since Halo's release, we have learned considerably more about nearby exoplanets.


 * On a general level, another goal of the project is to depict pronounced variety in space colonies: every planet and world isn't just another Earth, but an opportunity to explore different locales that might exist out there.


 * While the alien geometry of slipspace means some real-world interstellar distances may not fully map out to those distances' equivalents in slipspace, we still try to stick to real-world astronomy for the most part; i.e. while travel times may vary slightly depending on slipspace topology, the real-space distance still dictates the jump length within an order of magnitude. In exceptional cases, however, the use of Forerunner navigation interfaces (or drives) can shorten travel times considerably.


 * The map given in Halo: Warfleet for the Halos' and several other Forerunner sites' locations in the galaxy is ignored; Installation 04 is located some tens of light-years antispinward from Sol, while Installation 05 is located deeper spinward around where the Orion Spur branches off from the Sagittarius Arm. This is to make slipspace travel times seen in the story work better with the setting. On the same note, installations other than 04 and 05 will not be found for a while even in the post-war era.


 * The Bestiarum's claim that the Kig-Yar home system, Y'Deio, is the real-life star HD69830 is ignored, and Y'Deio is relocated further antispinward along the Orion Arm (see this map). This is because it would be unthinkable for a species homeworld the Covenant have been in contact with for over a millennium to be located only 41 light-years from Earth, a distance similar to many of humanity's own colonies. The departure from the Bestiarum is explained away as a case of an unreliable in-universe source in the Forerunner AI which compiled the Bestiarum.


 * Harvest and Arcadia are relocated to different star systems; BS Indi and HD 219077 ("Peloponnesus"), respectively. While we acknowledge that this is an overt "retcon" of otherwise-fixed pre-2009 canon, it is to make the cartography of the human sphere more cohesive, as both Epsilon Indi and Procyon are so close to Earth they should be classified as Inner Colonies. Epsilon Indi and Procyon are also inhabited in this version, but home to different colonies.

The Forerunners
The Forerunner civilization is the bedrock upon which the Halo universe' foundations are laid, and Daybreak is no exception. However, the Forerunners' allure, and the crux of their presence, is not in the present and in flashy technology and dazzling bright lights, but rather in the feelings of desolation, the sheer Ozymandian vastness of their relics, and the quiet moments when the wind whistles in their long-abandoned halls. Thus, while Forerunner artifacts and technology continue to play a role, they are more of a way of setting the stage than active players in the narrative.

Instead, one could say that the Covenant are to Daybreak's post-war universe what the Forerunners were to the 343i counterpart. Most notably, the Mantle (or its Reclamation) is treated more like a historical curiosity than a relevant carrying theme of the post-war era. This partly ties to the emphasis on consequences, in this case the consequences of the Forerunners' downfall. As the Halo 3 terminals tell us, the Librarian saw the folly of the Mantle in the Forerunners' final days, and ensured that as life reseeded and recovered, it would arise and flourish free of that past baggage -- and perhaps, for the first time in eons, make its own way in the cosmos.

We've also adopted a more minimalist approach to introducing Forerunner relics, at least those of strategic import. Game-changing artifacts should actually matter when they're introduced; otherwise they're forever doomed to repeat the tired "Forerunner MacGuffin gets destroyed to maintain the status quo" story formula. Not everything needs to be the biggest and baddest Forerunner artifact; sometimes ruins can be enough to create an atmosphere, and even fragmentary pieces of information or seemingly-mundane objects can have surprising narrative consequences. This is also why the discovery of the other Halo rings, the return to the Ark, and the full unveiling of Onyx have been moved to much later in the timeline. We work with the relics we have for as long as we can get interesting and relevant material out of them, then move on. Bringing more Halos, new Shield Worlds, Janus Keys, Absolute Records and Conduits prematurely will only make the narrative sandbox oversaturated with Forerunner artifacts, and the awe and mystery once associated with them turns into fatigue.

Firsthand knowledge on the Forerunners is scarce, and information on them always comes at a remove of a hundred millennia and usually through a subjective lens. Much about them is implied, not explicitly stated. This, coupled with the weathered and largely inert Forerunner ruins we see, is meant to add layers and texture to the world, enhancing its sense of history. The UNSC's knowledge of the Forerunners following the war is also less complete, though some records are recovered at Halos 04 and 05 as well as the Ark. Some inferences can also be drawn from translations of Covenant scripture, which serves as scholars' main source on the subject, but as second-, third-, or nth-hand sources with religious trappings, those are highly suspect.

The history of the Forerunners themselves, while left vague for the time being, can be assumed to follow the version shown in the and the, complete with the discovery of Earth and humanity only in the last days of the Flood war. While Greg Bear's Forerunner Saga is a great piece of literature in its own right, the series is also baggaged by having to serve as the backstory to a version of the setting different from our own, and so themes and plot lines crop up that have little to no relevance to Daybreak's universe or story. Still, much of the Forerunner era is left up to interpretation on purpose via e.g. unreliable narrators, leaving it up to readers to speculate how much of those events happened. Generally, a lot of the worldbuilding on the Forerunners' culture, society and technology from the Forerunner Saga can be assumed to apply in Daybreak as well, but much of their history does differ. For example, in Daybreak there can be assumed to have been only one Ark, seven Halo rings, and one Didact, and there's no indication that 343 Guilty Spark is anything but a floating robot (and a quite dead one at that). Notably, the Master Builder and several other notable Forerunners introduced since did exist, but the details on the era are fuzzy - or, as some would say, legendary.

The ancient human spacefaring civilization portrayed in 343i's fiction was never a thing, not as such. The evolution of life on Earth, and the rise of humankind, can be assumed to have occurred more or less according to modern-day scientific knowledge, with the obvious addition of the Halo event and the reseeding of life as well as potential meddling even earlier on. This also means the Forerunners' ancient wars with humanity never happened in Daybreak's continuity, not as such at least. This omission was made as we felt 343i's version overcomplicated things, created a jarring disconnect with Bungie-era sources, along with adding questions difficult to satisfactorily explain without resorting to handwaving, especially in regard to humanity's evolution or the total lack of evidence for ancient presence in the Sol system — something that a millennia-old interstellar civilization would certainly leave behind. We do retain unanswered questions over humanity's evolution and galactic history, but on a more subtle level. Hopefully, anyway.

What are Reclaimers?
There has also been some re-examination and redefinition done on the concept of Reclaimers and the human-Forerunner connection, based on the original trilogy, novels and particularly the Halo 3 terminals. 343i's post-war narrative, particularly in its early days, leaned heavily on the notion of humans being the rightful inheritors of the Mantle, and the Forerunner Saga's backstory was written to support this, going so far as to have the closest thing the setting has to gods spell it out directly. This notion is very intrinsic to 343i's post-war narrative and worldbuilding, and likely informed many of their decisions on where to take the story. Daybreak's lore goes in a completely different direction. For one, humanity's status as Reclaimers was not planned by anyone. Forerunner machines identify humans as Reclaimers because they recognize us as their makers' kind; for Reclaimer is what their makers named themselves. The Librarian wanted humanity to prosper, but she did not wish to bestow the Mantle on us. She implies as much in the Halo 3 terminals by denouncing the Mantle entirely as a failed philosophy that led to the Forerunners' downfall. As already implied, Daybreak's assumption is that as a general rule, all humans fulfill the biological requirements for being a Reclaimer. Likewise, the Librarian's geas/genesong and implied precision-guidance of humanity's evolution and development are omitted. Some evolutionary meddling may or may not be present, but not to the extent suggested in Halo 4, and the meaningless pop culture evolution jargon is out; e.g. notions like "accelerating" someone's evolution toward a particular goal, or this or that species' evolution being "more complete".

So, Forerunner technology reads humans as Reclaimers, or Forerunners. So we certainly qualify as Forerunner in a biological sense. But clearly terrestrial humans did not travel the stars 100,000 years ago; this is true in our world, and it is true in the Daybreak Continuum. The Iris ARG and the Halo 3 terminals are often used to argue against the idea that the Forerunners could ever have been human, but they in fact all but confirm it. As she and her team discovered Earth in the final days of the Flood war, the Librarian wrote that the planet's inhabitants may've one day yielded answers to the Forerunners' own mysteries, had there been time. had it the wrong way round; we are not the of an ancient interstellar species, the Forerunners were castaways from Earth. Their human or hominid ancestors were displaced from Earth before their recorded history and seeded elsewhere, while Earth was left untouched. Yet they had always known they did not belong on their supposed homeworld. And in the twilight hour of their civilization, the Librarian found their Cradle of Life - their lost Eden. It is true that ours is but one interpretation of the Terminal/Iris narrative which doesn't exactly provide clear answers, but it's probably the one that makes most sense and causes least headaches with real-life paleontology, evolution and genetics. 343i's version ignores all that and pretends We Just Don't Know because it was all neatly covered up. While realism isn't always the supreme goal of fiction, verisimilitude is a thing, though obviously whether you care about this sort of thing depends on how familiar you are with human evolution. Anyway, in short, just because we don't know everything doesn't mean we can just throw up our hands and act like we know nothing and can just replace it with something utterly outlandish that clearly contradicts most of what we know.

There is one alternate interpretation of the Iris narrative, based on ; namely that humanity did not evolve on Earth and was merely an offshoot of a galactic human/hominid empire. While this idea crops up in sci-fi from time to time, it would also require us to dismiss modern science entirely, so we're not using that either. In general, if there's a less convoluted way to handle something, it's probably the better one. Having the Forerunners be a divergent branch of Earth humanity displaced from Earth by parties unknown eons earlier, while the evolution of Earth's human population was left undisturbed, creates no mismatch with the 2001-2009 era fiction nor real-world science, so it's the one we're going with.

It is also true that 343i fiction flirts with the idea that maybe we are related to the Forerunners after all, but this solves less than one might think. Not only is humanity's ancient starfaring empire a problem that still persists, but genetics aren't some great mystery, especially to civilizations so far beyond us. We can read our DNA today and tell we are related to chimpanzees, dogs, crabs, trees, grass and everything else living on the planet. The very structure of DNA would most likely be different for beings that evolved on a different world. So the Forerunners would know instantly by just looking at our genetic code and theirs if they're related and if they are, how closely so. If the species are different enough for there to be ambiguity, then the distinction becomes academic and doesn't really matter anyway. It's clear that Humans and Forerunners separate in every sense that matters, and it's not exactly clear why. Even in 343i lore, ancient humans are already shown to be an incredibly diverse assortment of species and subspecies, so it doesn't seem obvious why the Forerunners couldn't be clearly established as one of them (or the other way around).

While most Forerunner constructs like Guilty Spark and Mendicant Bias identify us as Reclaimer, there is some element of discretion to this. While we may biologically qualify as Reclaimers, some Forerunner constructs aren't convinced on the basis of our behavior or other factors; for example, the Sentinels on Onyx reclassified humans as an "aboriginal subspecies" of Reclaimer. There may have been plans for the Forerunners themselves to return one day, but those ultimately went sideways with the chaos and desperation of the war, as well as Forerunner factionalism and data compartmentalization. The Forerunners' installations were left dormant waiting for the Reclaimers to arrive, and what instead did show up were their creators' close biological relatives - but most Forerunner AIs are too giddy about the prospect of meeting their creators again (or too rudimentary in their intelligence) to pay heed to the distinction.

What does this accomplish, compared to 343i's version? For one, it presents a smoother continuity from pre-2009 Halo fiction. There is no jarring shift wherein very explicit lines like "You ARE Forerunner" or "This is Reclaimer, and those it represents are my makers" are suddenly to be taken "from a certain point of view". It also doesn't require us to discard the entire fossil record and modern evolutionary biology, paleontology, geology, astronomy, and many other branches of science that we would have to assume are completely wrong in order to accept that Earth and the Solar System were occupied by starfaring civilizations as recently as 100,000 years BCE. It also removes some of the artificial luster around humanity: we should not be special because of some abstract characteristic somehow inherent to our species. In fact, we should not be special as a species collective at all - rather, individuals can be special, exceptional even, while most are utterly average. Whatever the case, it's our deeds that define us, not our blood. The fact we're related to the Forerunners doesn't mean anything; it's incidental, a cosmic happenstance that's also our misfortune in many ways.

As for the Covenant's knowledge on humanity's Reclaimer status, the masses aren't aware of it. It was kept secret specifically because of its damaging implications, and only the Prophets and those who worked with them at times knew. Since the war, however, rumors and speculation abound on the matter, though many ex-Covenant also dismiss these as unreliable. The Arbiter knows of the connection, having been present in the replacement Alpha Halo's control room where Guilty Spark very clearly announced it to the Master Chief. However, he keeps quiet about this knowledge and seeks to downplay it, for having the connection publicly known could lead to hostile factions among the ex-Covenant seeking to dominate or destroy humanity as a potential threat, or at the very least destabilize the rapport he seeks to build among the shattered Covenant.

The Halos
As mentioned in the astronomy section, the Halos have been slightly repositioned. As one minor change, Installation 03 is now known as Eta Halo by its Greek alphabetic designation rather than Gamma Halo, with the latter name being assigned to Installation 06 instead. This is to follow the naming established by the Halo 3 game files for the rings.

The Halo rings can be assumed to lack some of the additional capabilities introduced in the 343i era: namely, the ability to eject given pieces of terrain at will, effectively police a light-year of space around them, or maintain structural cohesion even with entire plates of superstructure missing. Such features are omitted because if applied consistently, they would seemingly prevent large parts of the Halo narrative from ever happening. For example, in the Conversations From the Universe booklet in the limited edition of Halo 2, civilizations are mentioned as having landed on Alpha Halo prior to the Covenant and the UNSC. If Guilty Spark had the ability and mandate to destroy any incoming ships at will, this would likely never have happened. Likewise, if Spark could eject the ring's terrain, why would he not use this capability to rid the ring of the Flood outbreak or a certain pesky meddling Reclaimer and his AI companion? Overall, the addition of these features introduces more problems than it solves, and so we have opted to leave them out.

The Flood
The Flood's origins are also left vague in Daybreak's version, at least for the time being. Forerunner records seem to indicate them to have been seemingly extragalactic in nature, but little else is known conclusively. The Precursors are likewise a mystery; according to what can be gleaned of Forerunner myths of their own origins, their species was tutored in their infancy by a greater civilization, and several discrepancies on the Forerunners' supposed homeworld made it explicit their species did not originally evolve there. This uncertainty over their own origins, as well as the myth of prehistoric displacement, potential evolutionary meddling, and tutelage by an ancient civilization now long gone -- whether that civilization were the fabled Precursors of Forerunner myth or not -- shaped much of Forerunner history and the way they viewed their place in the cosmos.

Humanity and the UNSC
Humanity's backstory follows official canon even more closely than the Covenant one, but there are various areas in which it has been expanded upon or reinterpreted. But the closer you get to the 26th century, the less deviation there is.


 * The dates for the settlement of the Inner Colonies are reframed as two major waves to explain a seeming discrepancy in the original Halo timeline. (see this post)


 * As part of the general definition of the scale and astrography of the setting, human colony numbers receive some clarification. As a general rule, the key Inner Colonies (ones with populations approaching or surpassing a billion) are in the low dozens, while the Outer Colonies that are in some way notable number in close to a hundred. ("Some way notable" implies meaningful exports to, and some degree of contact with, the greater human sphere; minor settlements with neither are not included, and many did not even go recorded by the UEG.) This is to highlight humanity's fairly short starfaring history at this point in the timeline, as well as to build up on a more focused set of worlds with unique characteristics as opposed to always creating new ones.


 * While the exact human population numbers can be kept vague, notable colonies can also safely be more populous than depicted in canon. With its population of 710 million, Reach is not humanity's most populous colony, as there are a handful of Inner Colonies with populations in the low billions.


 * Most of human society is not a "realistic" speculative extrapolation of the future, since that's not really what Halo is about, but we do try to lean on the slightly more futuristic interpretations over the more common "21st century America in space" one. This applies to e.g. the civilian use of cybernetics and other technologies, as well as some cultural quirks and historical layers; notably, in introducing more references to historical events or figures between the early 21st century and the 26th. In addition, various subcultures and splinter groups with more radical divergences from our everyday reality are explored, as well as some of the reasons why such movements never became mainstream and technological integration into society remained fairly conservative.


 * We have the goal of fleshing out the entire span of human history from the late 21st century onwards to the 26th century. Some of the information from the Halo Encyclopedia and other 343-era media still applies, but we'll also mercilessly modify things as we see fit in regards to technological, geopolitical and societal worldbuilding. For example, the Interplanetary War and the UNSC's formation (along with the geopolitics of the era) have received some additional attention to flesh them out (see Projects/Interplanetary Wars for our work-in-progress page).


 * We aim to explore the effects of humanity's history of space habitation on their societies. Significant systems (such as Epsilon Eridani and Sol) are pronouncedly populated both on a planetary level and in space. Sol, for example, has significant habitat conurbations and infrastructure over Earth, Mars and Jupiter and activity all over the place, including "indigenous" populations descended from early settlers in unexpected locales, like beneath Europa, in warrens on lesser moons of Saturn, or in distant comets and forgotten asteroids.


 * The Office of Naval Intelligence is decently powerful, but they are not omnipotent. Their resources or reach are not infinite, and they should not be thought of as a go-to excuse for secret super-tech that never pops up anywhere else. The goal is also to depict them as morally gray without being self-destructive or edgy (i.e. being edgy for edge's sake does not equate to making the hard decisions no one else can). In addition, we've aimed to highlight other aspects of their organization that have more to do with their primary role of gathering intelligence, as opposed to endless top secret super-projects.


 * Humanity only begins to gain access to intersystem superluminal communications circa the 2550s. Prior to this, interstellar communication is done exclusively via data transmitted aboard ships traversing slipspace. Likewise, FTL communications don't exist on the system level, meaning that there is always a "light lag", or a delay dictated by the speed of light, in intra-system communications.


 * What has become known as the United Rebel Front in 343i canon is given the name United Liberation Front. This is because the URF name, originally given in the , almost certainly originated from the fan wiki Halopedia; while Halo: Ghosts of Onyx references a "united rebel front" in a descriptive sense, the name did not appear in official material prior to the Encyclopedia. As the name is both a mistake as well as rather jingoistic and over-the-top for a major insurgent faction, we have chosen to rename the group.


 * The rarely-mentioned UNSC Air Force renamed the UNSC Aerospace Force to better reflect its role; this is barely a retcon even within our own "rules" as the Air Force had not appeared in canon pre-2009 aside from being briefly referenced in one interview.

The Covenant
Overall, Daybreak's depiction of the Covenant species, like that of humans, is meant to be balanced; portraying each culture as more than just simplistic generalizations, but rather well-rounded societies with their pros and cons. Like characters who evolve over time as they're given more attention, so too must factions and cultures. This means consciously avoiding pigeonholing cultures and characters into narrow archetypes, such as the Sangheili only being honor-bound and prideful warriors, or all Kig-Yar being pirates, all San'Shyuum being scheming manipulators, and so on. There are definitely cultural and societal trends, and then there's just repeating the same character over and over again. Another goal we hope to achieve is political nuance. Factions and affiliations don't always slot into clear-cut categories, and usually have far more going on than just one singleminded goal.

Of all Halo authors, Daybreak's depiction of the Covenant meta-civilization leans most on 's style, specifically the ways he characterized the Covenant in Halo 2 and Contact Harvest. The original trilogy marked a fairly logical progression in our understanding of the Covenant as a civilization as they developed from a zealous, single-minded alien horde into a full-fledged society with a vast history, politics and tensions, dreams and hopes. With Project Daybreak, we have sought to embrace and continue this development into the post-war era, as our understanding of the Covenant meta-civilization grows and the Covenant themselves come to terms with their past and future. However, even as we expand upon the Covenant, we also learn how little we really know of the galaxy and its mysteries overall, revealing new vistas just beyond the horizon.

In general, the Covenant backstory follows the outline of that in the Halo canon, though it has received considerable expansion, and some changes have been made when it comes to their backstory in post-2009 lore. It should be noted that Halo 3 ' s is regarded as a semi-unreliable in-universe source; while we try to stick to the Bestiarum for the most part, some details are reinterpreted, especially population numbers (several of which are increased in Daybreak). Most other deviations are listed below.


 * Several dates from the pre-Covenant era ignore the Halo Encyclopedia's timeline, such as the length of the Reformists' flight on the Keyship and the length of the War of Beginnings. These are simply to shorten extended spans of time with essentially nothing happening.


 * The Unggoy are discovered considerably earlier than established by the Halo Encyclopedia's timeline. It never seemed right that they'd been part of the Covenant for just 400 years given how integrated they are, and even the Bestiarum's entry for the Kig-Yar implied the Unggoy were already around by the time the Kig-Yar were assimilated (despite seemingly contradicting this in the timespan given for the Unggoy's indoctrination in the Unggoy entry).


 * Like in 343i canon, the Arbiter's role experiences a decline during the Covenant, but the institution's downfall is the sum of many historical and societal factors rather than the result of one individual's failure. This is to make the setting more dynamic, the debasement of the title more believable, and the Prophet-Elite juxtaposition less of a binary good-and-evil conflict.


 * The Jiralhanae have been involved with the Covenant for over a millennium in a fringe capacity and were spread to many more worlds than Doisac, though their date of formal incorporation to the hegemony remains the same. This change was made to explain how the Jiralhanae could ever be considered a viable replacement for the Sangheili within decades of their assimilation, when the Sangheili would realistically outnumber them to hilarious extents, as well as the characterization of the Sangheili-Jiralhanae rivalry as "ancient" in Ghosts of Onyx. (see this post for more)


 * As another change from the Bestiarum, the Yanme'e homeworld Palamok has a low, rather than high, gravity. It doesn't seem logical that a 2G environment would give rise to giant flying insectoids, especially when the Yanme'e apparently need gravitic aids to fly in a normal gravity.

Human-Covenant War

 * The Battle of Reach follows the version of the Fall of Reach presented in The Fall of Reach and First Strike, while incorporating most of the events of Halo: Reach with major modifications to the timeline. This was decided because despite 343i's attempts to reconcile the two, TFoR and Reach are only compatible in the loosest sense, and it's much more straightforward to change one source than all of them.


 * The Cole Protocol includes not merely the erasure of human navigational records, but the planting of diversionary data - thousands of "ghost colonies" in empty sectors of space, a large-scale ONI effort known as Operation: WORM BOX. These decoy colonies took up the Covenant's resources considerably over the course of the war.


 * Aside from effective counterintelligence, a key reason the UNSC was able to hold off for so long was that they fought back like a mad dog, constantly striking back at Covenant supply lines, forward operating bases, refueling and refit stations and other infrastructure. SILENT STORM remained the only blow they were able to deal on Covenant space proper (depending on the definition), since following that mission the Covenant began to take longer, more indirect routes to human space to safeguard their own worlds. Multiple UNSC battlegroups operated with virtual autonomy for years on end behind enemy lines, constantly keeping the Covenant on their toes, and entire battalions of Marines and ODSTs were sacrificed on assaults on Covenant targets. The SPARTAN-III deployments PROMETHEUS, TORPEDO, and BONFIRE remained the most successful of such operations (though ODSTs would probably tell you otherwise), but they were a reflection of a larger trend.


 * Humanity's main shield was the vastness of space. Mighty as the Covenant was, they weren't used to carrying out campaigns far outside their borders in mostly unknown territory, and comparatively small as the human sphere was, there were still countless more empty systems within than occupied ones, particularly within the Outer Colonies. Eventually, however, the Covenant did start picking up on a pattern of human settlement being denser toward the core. Yet the war was hardly a straightforward progression from the Outer Colonies to the Inner Colonies, simply because the Covenant didn't attack from all sides, and because the Inner Colony border was not consistent in the first place. The Covenant would've had to know the shape and extent of the human sphere to plan a logical invasion spiraling from the fringes to the center, and they didn't, and were further thrown off by ONI's counterintelligence. As a result, about a 1/5 slice of the human sphere remained almost untouched by the war, with most of the surviving worlds there being remote Outer Colonies which survived precisely because of their distance from both Earth and the Covenant's invasion fronts.


 * Minor changes are made to the timeline of the events of Halo: Ghosts of Onyx to preserve consistency in slipspace travel times. Notably, the Onyx Conflict has been moved forward in time from its original November 3 setting, with its final stages now occurring on November 14, 2552. However, the events themselves do not change. For the exact timeline, see here.


 * Some revisions are made to 343i's version of the timeline of the Battle of the Ark. The battle itself now takes place over three days, from December 11 to 13, in contrast to happening entirely on December 11. The Shadow of Intent now returns to Earth on January 6, with the Arbiter following on January 13. This was to retain consistency with the travel time of the portal transit from Earth to the Ark, whereas in 343i's version the return trip was markedly faster. Notably, the Shadow of Intent does not return to Sanghelios between its return to Earth and the Voi Memorial, departing only after the ceremony, as this was clearly the narrative intent in Halo 3.

Post-war era
In Project Daybreak's version of the post-war era, developments are allowed to happen slowly, over decades, rather than them all being compressed into a period of four years; this is to give the setting more breathing room.

The general impression one got from 343i's post-war fiction was that the Human-Covenant War ultimately wasn't that big of a deal. While we see some glassed worlds, there is an equal number of surviving colonies with thriving industries; and many of the glassed worlds have already been reterraformed just five short years later. Not only that, the UNSC was apparently building an ultimate super-ship in secret along with a revolutionary new batch of Spartans, all of which conveniently went online within weeks of the war's end. Then the UNSC started pumping out hundreds of new ships without a care in the world. On the Covenant side, the Great Schism seemingly died down in a couple of months, and with minor exceptions was not heard of again.

In contrast to 343i's fiction, Daybreak puts much less emphasis on the Forerunner era spilling over to the modern day, nor is Reclamation a defining theme or conflict; the entire notion of Reclamation differs (see the "Forerunner backstory" section above), and the Mantle is just an old philosophy that has little to no relevance in the present, except in the minds of some Forerunner constructs. This is because to us, the most interesting parts of the post-war setting usually don't have anything to do with the Mantle, though similar ideas can definitely manifest in other forms.

For a still-incomplete timeline of the post-war era, see this page.

UNSC
For the UNSC and humanity as a whole, we've tried to properly reexamine the ramifications of the war, what the transition to peace would really mean, and how long it would take. The UNSC will spend much of 2553 and 2554 simply winding down from war footing, figuring out what's left, and recalling battlegroups on remote assignments, and overall the rest of the 2550s are a precarious time in many ways. The overall climate for the next three or four years is less unambiguously triumphant and more apprehensive, as the Covenant loyalists are slowly driven back from the human sphere, and the alliance with the Arbiter's Concord takes shape. We've tried to communicate an overall social and cultural shift wherein humans are no longer in their own bubble, but part of a wider interstellar community now whether we like it or not. This is already a theme in 343i's work to some extent, but it's not communicated as clearly because the ex-Covenant is given little civilizational character beyond a few scattered planets. In any case, the Covenant is really, really big and very old, which will be showing in various ways.

The UNSC Infinity or the Spartan-IVs don't exist, not as such, though similar ideas are explored in other forms, such as various new ship classes later on, as well as the ODST Hoplite program. This is one of our more obvious changes in comparison to 343i's version, but is reflective of a broader trend of consciously avoiding the UNSC's implied miracle recovery that was especially prevalent in Halo 4-era 343i material. We feel that this was not a narratively satisfying turn, serving only to contrive a flipped power dynamic for its own sake. The Infinity and the Spartan-IVs, while a symptom rather than the overall problem, are also the most prominent embodiment of that underlying issue in 343i's canon: a recovery that was so quick and convenient we barely even saw it happen.

As well, other technological upgrades are more modest; the UNSC will have access to Covenant-derived slipspace drives and FTL communicators, but their numbers are limited until the 2560s. FTL communications are also not universal, require considerable physical infrastructure to operate, and are not real-time outside in-system communications; still, much of the human sphere has been linked to the network by the 2570s. In some areas, human technology actually regresses for a time as the specialist infrastructure and expertise required to build and maintain it is lost, and other interests - mainly relief and reconstruction - are prioritized.

The UNSC fleet is gradually modernized, but there are more stumbling blocks and half-measures on the way; everything doesn't just work out splendidly; budget cuts reign in this era, and technicians and engineers are in short supply, forcing the UNSC to adopt various compromises and creative solutions; for one, many new ship designs are rolled out unfinished, only to be upgraded with various modern developments as they become available. Rather than full energy shields, ships are fitted with EM buffers to disrupt incoming plasma munitions; rather than every ship receiving new drives or FTL comms kits, only battlegroup flagships do, and lesser vessels must piggy-back on them. Things are cobbled together from various sources, including outdated tech and scavenged Covenant materials. In the absence of resources, a lot of things are improvised.

The war and its fallout will also mark an upheaval in human society and politics. The United Earth Government, sidelined during the war, loses much of its power in the grand scheme of things. As the UEG remains reluctant to reassume power after the war, the UNSC establishes an interim coalition known as the Phoenix Initiative to facilitate the colonies' reclamation and the resettlement of the various populations displaced by the war.

Some worlds attacked by the Covenant survived with minor damage, and can be reclaimed with relative ease, though some retain Covenant stragglers. Worlds targeted by strategic plasma bombardment, or full glassing, can only be reclaimed in the long term, with estimates ranging from decades to up to three centuries of ecosphere restoration and reterraforming. Covenant terraforming technologies provided by the Concord can expedite this process in some cases, but the timeline of reclamation efforts is still measured in the order of decades, rather than years.

Another characteristic of Daybreak's post-war UNSC is that they are much more confined to the Human Sphere and its neighborhood, though some missions may be carried out to the fringes of Covenant space. This means that the galactic-scale power projection we often see in 343i's fiction is out of the question for now, and the UNSC won't be intervening in places like Sanghelios or Balaho any time soon.

The Insurrection
The Insurrection -- or more aptly, colonial independence movements -- continues to be a presence post-war, but there are developments that will change its course in the future; for one, the Phoenix Initiative's FTL communications and faster ships - limited as they are at first - will bring faraway colonies closer. The entire power dynamic of the human sphere has shifted, and the UNSC is no longer the biggest kid on the block; the emergence of post-Covenant factions as a permanent threat means the need for defense is greater than before, potentially motivating colonies that cannot defend themselves to accept UNSC control. On the other hand, trade with ex-Covenant as well as other factors like regional alliances will increase the self-sufficiency and power of certain colonies. As well, many colonies will have seeded their own colonies further out that not even the UEG knows of, which will change power dynamics in the future. The most notable breakaway faction to emerge from the war is known as the Via Casilina Community, consisting of colonies which survived the war by virtue of being furthest away from the Covenant's incursion points.

Another factor of note that doesn't exist in canon is the Strewn Shore: a collection of colonies beyond the Via Casilina worlds, settled by a flotilla of refugees from High Charity. They become an important player in the affairs of the further-out colonies of the human Sector 3, and serve as one of the places where human and ex-Covenant societies intersect in the post-war decades.

The post-Covenant


A major goal of Project Daybreak was to bring complexity and nuance into the post-Covenant, as well as to give them greater agency in the overall narrative. Far too often have ex-Covenant factions been almost exclusively defined by their relationship to humanity, whether it is a positive or antagonistic one. Particularly in the latter case, these factions are shown as having very little independent existence of their own beyond their seeming obsession with humans. Such groups come across as hollow because we never have a solid idea of what kind of cultural context and history they or their ideas stem from.

A development peculiar to 343i's post-war era was the way most of the Covenant client species conveniently returned to their home planets once the Covenant collapsed. This might make sense with a loose alliance that had existed for a few decades, maybe even centuries. But the Covenant was over three millennia old, and the way its client species were intrinsically integrated to the hierarchy was near-total in many places. Thus it naturally follows that for the most part, those species aren't just going to arbitrarily go their separate ways because the upper management is gone. High Charity was powerful to be sure, but the Prophets didn't micromanage every facet of Covenant life across thousands of worlds. As a vast interstellar empire, the Covenant is going to have local governing structures and sub-polities in place, on top of widespread commerce across their territories. And those institutions and structures aren't going to disappear overnight; some aren't going to disappear at all, though all will be impacted by the Great Schism. When thinking of the post-Covenant, our approach has been not to think of the client species as closed, homogeneous units and more as collections of groups that are part of the interconnected whole of the Covenant meta-civilization. This also informs how our post-Covenant factions take shape. We ask questions like how do the histories of different regions or populations affect their views now? How are the population migrations, schisms, wars and alliances that shaped regional cultures reflected in the present? In short, we are applying the same standards to the Covenant as we are to humanity when it comes to their interstellar development.

In terms of ex-Covenant motivations and goals, Daybreak seeks to underline the thematic importance of the original Halo trilogy's narrative, and particularly its ending. This means that the Covenant is, for all intents and purposes, defeated. Not just as an organization, but in terms of what they represent as a threat, which informs what conflicts the narrative prioritizes. Antagonists with the primary goal of eradicating humanity will take the back seat to other conflicts; such factions will still exist within the universe, but they are not narratively significant in the grand scheme of things. This does not mean the UNSC will run out of enemies, but those enemies' motivations will have more variety and nuance. For example, you can still have warlords who wish to assimilate humanity as a client species, or to neutralize the potential threat the UNSC represents, and/or be ideologically or religiously opposed to the UNSC's use of artificial intelligence or their exploitation of Forerunner artifacts. Think outside the box; things get interesting when you have more to work with. Also, religiously-motivated factions can be surprisingly interesting and deep, as long as that religion is given proper definition and character; just note that there's more to the Covenant faith than "exterminate all humans". Particularly to the Sangheili, the idea of continuing the war becomes something of a taboo after the Hierarchs' duplicity is partly uncovered; for the campaign of genocide is a living reminder of the Prophets' treachery, which the Sangheili want nothing to do with.

For that matter, a large portion of post-2009 fiction failed to acknowledge some of the fundamental root causes for the Great Schism; namely, the growing rumblings of discontent among the Sangheili against the Covenant leadership, including but not limited to their questioning why humanity was not allowed a place in the Covenant. N'tho 'Sraom was outright stated to have been part of a growing human-sympathetic movement among the Sangheili. Such mentions, while brief, are crucial for understanding the Prophet of Truth growing wary of the Sangheili, and eventually going so far as to cast them aside. Without widespread and prolonged questioning of the Prophets' legitimacy, Truth lacks sufficient motivation to cast down the Sangheili as a whole, and the Schism comes out of nowhere. Aside from their role in enabling both the Covenant's breaking and the Sangheili-human alliance, such compunctions also serve to remind us that the Covenant are able to be characters in their own right and think on their own, rather than mere stereotypes. However, post-2009 Halo fiction adopted a rather cynical perspective into the whole matter, especially early on; few of the post-Covenant (particularly Sangheili) were shown displaying compunctions or self-reflection about the war, and the movements of dissident Sangheili during the war would never be acknowledged. This may seem like a small point, but it is important to understanding the thematic foundations upon which we aim to build Daybreak's conceptualization of the post-Covenant. It does not mean that all Sangheili will be penitent about the war or friendly to humans, not by a long shot, but it does mean that the Sangheili's self-reflection will be relevant to the narrative rather than being shrugged off because it's inconvenient. Much of the potential of the post-Covenant lies those hard questions of identity, shame and repentance, and refusing to address that is taking the easy way out. Some of the ex-Covenant grappling with those hard questions will go for the convenient option of denial. Others will take steps to try and make amends. The important thing is that we see that variety in perspectives.

Consequently, Daybreak's focus leans more on sociological exploration and development than spectacle and threat escalation. While cooperation between humanity and the ex-Covenant species is beset by many challenges both without and within, it is not inherently doomed to failure; overall, there is more emphasis on the cooperation side of things than not, while still injecting due political nuance. For the aforementioned reasons, there are broadly speaking far more Sangheili who are either in some way sympathetic or indifferent about humanity than there are those who would wipe us out. On the other hand, many Jiralhanae do wish to continue the war, as their claim to legitimacy -- as bestowed upon them by Truth -- rests on it.

On that note, the Great Schism does not fizzle out in a month or two as it seemingly did in 343i's fiction. Instead, the conflict between the Elites and the Brutes continues up until the mid-2560s, only dying out as the largest Covenant loyalist chiefdoms are defeated. At the same time, though, we try to introduce nuances to the conflict beyond the high-level Sangheili-Jiralhanae juxtaposition, even as that ancient rivalry drives much of the conflict. The enduring Schism also contributes to the that the Sangheili civil war or the Blooding Years being delayed until around the 2570s.

In terms of technology and socio-cultural cohesion, the ex-Covenant will suffer the consequences of High Charity's loss, but we hope to provide a more nuanced version of just how that happens, on what scales and over what kind of time span. The Sangheili's almost-comical technical ineptitude which reached its zenith in Glasslands' infamous barn scene is significantly downplayed, and there is no unexplained mass disappearance of Huragok. We've put some thought into just how the division of labor would have worked in the Covenant and what extent of technological hegemony would've been practical in day-to-day life - e.g. because there are only so many San'Shyuum, most of whom hang out in High Charity, there has to be a level of technology other species can repair, even if they do not understand all of the underlying principles (see Covenant technology classification for more).

The largest polity to emerge from the Covenant's fall is the Concord of Reconciliation, led by the Arbiter, Thel 'Vadam. The Concord is a relatively loose alliance committed to not only eliminating the remaining Truth loyalists, but also salvaging whatever social order and technological prowess that can be salvaged out of the Covenant's fall. The Concord consists of dozens of largely Sangheili-led autonomous factions across the vast Covenant Sphere. On the local level, this includes the Sanghelios-based Swords of Sanghelios, but the Arbiter himself is not actually involved with the Swords at all as his focus is much wider than Sanghelios. The Concord was created because in order to truly be a visionary leader capable of providing a convincing alternative to the Covenant, the Arbiter has to have a scope wider than one planet or even one species. In an empire of thousands of worlds, focusing on one planet would merely make him seem myopic.

Because of the radically recontextualized power dynamic between the UNSC and the ex-Covenant, the events of the Kilo-Five trilogy not only never happen, but they also realistically cannot happen in this version. ONI will attempt to play ex-Covenant factions against one another, but this largely happens in their own turf, or in the contested crossing regions between the human and ex-Covenant spheres. ONI does not have the resources, intel or practical ability to project power to ex-Covenant space proper; even reaching Sanghelios in the first place would take weeks if not months, and navigating the tangle of political affiliations in the Covenant's old core would be so far beyond their ability it's not even funny. In turn, ex-Covenant polities will also play human polities off of one another, particularly those with strongly anti-alien sentiments. Several anti-alien factions spring up after the war's end, as there is much pent-up anger at the Covenant, and the UNSC/Phoenix Initiative's policy of appeasement - the only practical option as it may be - infuriates a lot of people.

Onyx
The events following the closure of Onyx diverge considerably from 343i's version. While the exact events around the continuation of Onyx are still yet to be fully established, a basic outline exists. There is more to the story behind the Dyson sphere itself, and the circumstances of the survivors' escape differ.

Following the Battle of Onyx, the Zeta Doradus system remains a hazard zone as Onyx's Sentinels configure themselves in defensive mode, attacking any ship that attempts to approach. This has further implications, as the Sentinels' convenient omission in 343i's canon meant that the UNSC was able to operate freely around the Onyx site. SCPO Mendez, Blue Team and most of the Spartan-IIIs eventually escape the sphere via an exit portal aboard a Forerunner transit system. However, Dr. Halsey chooses to stay behind as there is still much to learn about the site, while Blue Team's priority is to return to the UNSC as soon as possible. One major consequence of this is that Halsey is not present in the post-war decades, and it'll be a while before we hear of her again. Likewise, while Blue Team and Mendez escape, Onyx remains closed off in its slipspace bubble, fortified within Onyx's core and guarded by a vast swarm of sentinels; this won't change for decades, maybe centuries. Onyx will keep most of its secrets for now, aside from what Blue Team is able to take with them.

This is because Onyx ultimately did not justify its continued presence in 343i's narrative. It, like many other Forerunner megastructures, was merely added to the sandbox of the post-war era but nothing of substance was done with it. Any stories set there might as well have taken place in any other Forerunner installation. With Daybreak, we're shooting for quality over quantity when it comes to big Forerunner artifacts, so when they are present, we try to make sure they have an impact. And so will Onyx once it becomes relevant again, as one of the major Forerunner discoveries that punctuate the overarching timeline of the universe.

The Ark
The events of Hunters in the Dark or Halo Wars 2 never happen, because the Ark is only accessed again over three decades later. Hunters in the Dark is omitted because having the Ark accessed again within a couple of years would be very anticlimactic. When the Ark is accessed, in the new conflicts of the 2580s, it's going to be a big deal.

As for the fate of the Spirit of Fire, it's pending. But what we can say for sure is that they won't get magically spirited away to the Ark — nor will the continuation of the Halo Wars story have anything to do with the Ark at all.

The Master Chief and Cortana
The events of Halo 4 or Halo 5 don't happen. The Master Chief is set to return eventually, but under markedly different circumstances, and as far as Daybreak's current planning goes, he's still in cryo. This also means the Didact never awakens, because there never were two Didacts in the first place. As such, the attack on New Phoenix doesn't happen in this version, but since there is nothing else planned for that location at the moment, contributors may consider if some other disaster might befall that city should it become narratively relevant. The Created uprising also doesn't happen in this timeline, for obvious reasons. However, the overarching theme of AIs' relationship with humanity will be addressed in the post-war years and beyond, though hopefully in subtler ways. The Assembly from Halo: Reach's data pads - most pointedly their decision to deepen their ties with humanity - will be a factor as well, and it is expected that (after an initial period of stagnation due to loss of industry and expertise) smart AI development will continue to make progress throughout the later years of the 26th century and into the future, along with developments in the relationship and power dynamic between AIs, humans and potentially other species.

Long-term future
The next defining event of the post-war era will be the New Diaspora: mankind's decades-long (and in many cases, permanent) exile from Earth and the Sol system after a post-Covenant warlord -- Daybreak's version of Jul 'Mdama, whose backstory is retooled -- takes it over at the beginning of the 2580s. This is both revenge for his betrayal by ONI, and a pragmatic stratagem to take over the portal to the Ark, inactive as it may be for the moment. However, this version of the character, at this point in time, is also content with letting the human population either leave or submit to his rule, rather than outright exterminating them. While some humans remain in Sol, they will be little more than Jul's subjects, denied advanced technology and under constant watch. So most opt to leave, and over the course of several years, much of the human population migrates away from Sol, ending up on existing UEG worlds, new colonies established after the war, and independent colonies, as well as worlds predominated by ex-Covenant. The UNSC and the Phoenix Initiative survive, though much reduced, now based out of a number of surviving extrasolar systems; however, they also become more mobile than before, based out of ships and mobile habitats rather than planets. But it does mark the effective end of the UEG. The Diaspora is also destined to end, after Jul's arc reaches its endgame at the Ark and a UNSC force retakes the Sol system, but things are still irrevocably changed and many of those who fled will never return. Suffice it to say, the Ark and the Portal will continue to be relevant in more ways than one.

Beyond the 2600s, things are still a bit fuzzy. Utilization of the Ark's industrial capacity and the opening of more portals will eventually usher in an age of progress that once again shifts the power balance in the Orion Arm, but it'll still be a good while before that happens.

Technology, ships and vehicles
Generally speaking, what a technology can do and what implications it has on the setting around it is generally more important than the specific process by which it works. So, for example, the exact operating process of a fusion drive is less important than the fact such a drive can burn at consistent accelerations for long periods of time compared to traditional alternatives, which decidedly has an impact on the setting. The same goes for technologies like superluminal communications or slipspace travel: the effects and limitations of the technology are much more important than the technobabble, and should always be thought through when introducing new technologies.


 * Most ship and weapon designs that have appeared since 2009 are subjected to scrutiny, and many do not appear (e.g. most armor designs, and some of the more exotic REQ items in Halo 5). Some weapons and vehicles do exist but their designs have been reimagined to suit Daybreak's art style.


 * Individual teleportation is not the same thing as an interstellar slipspace portal. Even Forerunner slipspace transits are not instant across interstellar distances, and in general, the assumption is that interstellar portals are meant for ships, not individuals. Overall, portal technology (like any other plot-convenient tech) should be used with care, and preferably not at all if it is only done as a plot shortcut.


 * We're spacing out technological developments and the reverse-engineering of Covenant tech a bit more to the last few years of the war and the post-war decades, as opposed to it all being congested to January-March 2553 (and to a lesser extent, 2553-2557). A lot of technological development and industry actually slowed down in the later years of the war as procurement chains and specialist industries in the colonies broke down. Stopgap solutions dominated and will continue to dominate up until the 2650s.


 * The Huragok are not the insta-win buttons certain sources present them as. They are good at fixing things, less so at innovating; they can create new things, but they cannot work miracles (e.g. turn metal transparent or refit dropships with slipspace drives).

Ships and vehicles

 * The CSO and CRS cruisers do not make it in as such; equivalent ships are given more unique designs, and the CSO is quite a bit smaller.


 * Following the war, there is a clearer continuity from late-war UNSC ship designs to post-war ones. War-era ships remain in mainline use for some time, though many receive gradual upgrades as new technology becomes available. Late-war upgrades will inform improvements in the post-war era; structural enhancements that proved themselves during the war are put to production on new ships. For example, new UNSC vessels are to be equipped with improved superstructures, double hulls, ablative armor, and prismatic chaff screens designed to scatter lasers and particle beams. Later on, UNSC ships will begin to receive reflective nanolaminate-coated hulls -- or sections thereof -- to better defend against lasers and other directed-energy weaponry. Full starship energy shields are possible but not cost-effective nor energy-efficient for the postwar UNSC in most cases; anti-plasma EM shunts are more of a precision solution that exemplifies the UNSC's strengths of optimization and use of AI automation, which is required to calculate the electromagnetic gradients to precisely intercept torpedoes. However, the utility of these devices remains limited until upgraded Autumn-style reactor designs pan out, boosting UNSC vessels' power generation capability especially in combat situations.
 * Introducing new warship types takes time, and typically involves years of military-industrial politics and compromises; most of those surrounding the question of whether to upgrade older ships or build all-new ones. Most new ship types introduced within a decade of the end of the war were already being planned during the war, but did never come about due to the constant pressure on the UNSC.

Weapons

 * Plasma torpedoes retain their incorporeal nature from early Halo fiction, in contrast to post-Mortal Dictata lore, which retconned them into physical cores with a plasma sheath. This is done to preserve their uniqueness as well as some of the key plot beats of Halo: First Strike; for example, Cortana turns the plasma torpedo turrets of the Ascendant Justice into scalpel-like beams, which would be impossible to accomplish if the torpedoes had physical cores as opposed to being pure plasma shaped by magnetic field emitters aboard the ship. Having the plasma torpedoes be non-physical projectiles also makes them more powerful, as they cannot be shot down by conventional means, preserving the Covenant's threat level shown in the original novels. However, Daybreak retains the 343i-era interpretation of plasma torpedoes in the form of a separate weapon system, known as plasma missiles. Each of these weapons has its own pros and cons: plasma torpedoes are more difficult to counter but have a shorter range, while plasma missiles can be launched over longer ranges but can be shot down by concentrated point defense.


 * Covenant glassing capabilities fall within a middle ground between what was suggested in the early Nylund novels (i.e. full planetary glassing within hours) and the Halo: Reach data pads (i.e. planetary glassing purportedly taking up to three decades of achieve). Full planetary glassing is still possible, but can take months (depending on the size and composition of the fleet), and is only done under select circumstances; this is carried over from ' ' '.


 * The NOVA bomb's destructive power is kept within the limits of the description given in Halo: Ghosts of Onyx, while the notion introduced in Halo: Envoy of the bomb cracking the Sangheili colony world Glyke into small pieces is ignored. This is because the explosion described in Envoy would require yields vastly larger than previously indicated or what is feasible, even keeping in mind the NOVA's advanced design. The NOVA event at Glyke still happens in Daybreak's timeline, just with the explosion's power readjusted to match the effects described in Ghosts of Onyx, i.e. much of the planet's face adjacent to the detonation being scorched and the rest being wracked by high-speed winds and tsunamis.

Characters

 * Several characters are aged up to fix seeming inconsistencies in their portrayal in the narrative, and partly to reflect advances in medical technology. (exact ages/birth dates are still TBA)
 * Dr. Halsey is some years older to better reflect her portrayal in the original Nylund novels. Since she remains on Onyx, she's not involved at all in the post-war decades.
 * Chief Mendez is about 15 years older than his canon incarnation, as he is depicted as a veteran instructor by the time of the start of the SPARTAN-II program.
 * Stanforth is considerably older, Lord Hood to a lesser extent. In Stanforth's case specifically, this is to fix several inconsistencies regarding his age and rank.


 * Admiral Parangosky grows senile and detached from reality in her later years, thanks to both longtime stress and stimulant overuse. It is only thanks to her more level-headed subordinates that some of her more destructive plans are never put to practice, and eventually she is quietly retired. Serin Osman will in all likelihood be replaced by an original character.


 * The Arbiter is a much more active character post-war. In an inversion of his title change in Glasslands, he doesn't even seek to be Kaidon of Vadam again, and probably wouldn't qualify anyway; instead, he now goes primarily by his title as the Arbiter, which is symbolic of his "rebirth" as well as supposedly impartial role. He is an aggressive unifier and reformer who zips around the Covenant sphere, making alliances, dispensing justice to his foes, and relief to his subjects. He grows into his role as the Arbiter by presiding over the Schism Councils, a series of convocations meant to mitigate the damage caused by the Covenant's shattering. In time, however, his succession will be another question in its own right. Mighty as he may be, the Arbiter was still one burdened by his past crimes as well as the Covenant's old modes of thinking. And the true fruition of his Concord, should it come to pass, may need perspective not even Thel himself was capable of.


 * After they emerge from Onyx (exact date TBA), Blue Team continues to operate in the configuration we left them at the end of Ghosts of Onyx, for a time anyway. At some point, something like the Gao conflict might happen, though its outcomes may differ (Gao still definitely exists here, and so do most of its inhabitants). In any case, Tom and Lucy will end up parting ways with Blue at some point in the post-war years, and Team Saber might get reformed under Ash's command, potentially with replacements for Dante and Holly from the greater Gamma Company. (The Ferret setup is fun in its own context, but may not work here.) But all of this is still pending further work.


 * As our largest "retcon" of pre-2009 canon (namely Halo: Uprising), Colonel James Ackerson survives the Human-Covenant War. This is not out of any particular fondness for the Colonel, but rather because we believe killing such a major character off in a disposable comic series was not only cheap and unnecessary, but it may've been the result of a writer miscommunication.


 * Edward Buck and Alpha-Nine are out there, and continued on being ODSTs for some time, with markedly less drama involved.


 * Jul 'Mdama is in, and his arc is meant to stay largely true to the spirit of the character in canon if not the letter, but the timeline and many of the actual events on his path are altered radically to better suit the overall universe of Daybreak.


 * Many other 343i-era characters may still exist in the Daybreak Continuum, though we may not explicitly address their status unless it becomes relevant. Thomas Lasky and his buddies from Corbulo are in, since the "flashback" segments of Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn still take place, though Lasky's status post-war is not yet determined; he might end up commanding a ship, though. Rion Forge and her crew are likewise out there, and her goals are similar, but her journey will differ considerably to reflect the different technology level, travel times, and reduced Forerunner presence in the narrative (Spark is definitely dead, and not coming back). Sarah Palmer led a moderately successful career as an ODST fireteam leader.

Spartans
We try to avoid 343i's pitfall of Spartan-II numbers creep, and the consequent need to remedy this with lore band-aids. Because post-2009 material is ignored, Black Team is out, as is Halo Wars 2's version of Omega Team, along with a number of one-off Spartans of suspect story relevance (e.g. the ones who committed suicide in Homecoming). Less than a handful of the washouts may have been rehabilitated for combat duty, but these should be treated as exceptions rather than an easy way to add new Spartan-IIs. Overall, Spartans are one part of a larger cast, but not the end-all of Halo characters. Daybreak's approach is not about whether we can justify the existence of more S-IIs or IIIs, it's about preserving their narrative weight. See the List of Spartans for a tentative list to keep track of the Spartans' numbers.

Tonally, Spartans are less superhero and more supersoldier. This means no flashy ornamentation as well as an overall emphasis in the Spartans' role as part of a military organization, complete with the support and logistics that come with that. In addition, Spartans, by default, are already very special and exceptional. As such, we try to avoid the fandom (and at times canon) trope of "extra special" Spartans or edgy hyper-lethal lone-wolf assassins and the like. On that note, the Spartan designs that have only solidified in the 343i era may get some reexamining and redefinition. Since there are fewer armor variants in Daybreak, more Spartans will wear either default armor or default armor with attachments, but not altogether unique suits. Kelly, for example, mostly wears default MJOLNIR and so does Fred, though attachments and specific pieces may vary, on top of Spartans always wearing gear appropriate to the mission environment anyway (e.g. EVA kits on microgravity operations).

Likewise, we try to stay true to Ghosts of Onyx's thematic framing for the Spartan-III program. This includes downplaying the use of the ill-defined "cat-II" concept introduced in Halo: Reach as a get out of jail free card to have large numbers of surviving Alpha or Beta Company Spartan-IIIs running around. As mentioned before, less is often more, and too much of a cool thing will make it mundane. MJOLNIR-wearing teams such as NOBLE are not altogether absent, but they shouldn't be treated as the norm. Since Daybreak's narrative focus is oriented forward, it is instead the Gamma and potentially Delta Companies who will provide a box of new Spartans to play with in the post-war era.
 * As for "cat-II", don't assume it will stick around as default terminology or even as a formally-codified concept. More than any inherent superiority, Spartan-IIIs' absence from their parent companies was often due to luck, unrelated special assignments and other miscellaneous factors.
 * The history of Gamma Company's deployments is still undergoing revision, but over 2/3 of the Gammas made it through the war. They will make up the bulk of the UNSC's Spartan force in the post-war years. The "Smoother Problem" remains as the brain mutations responsible are irreversible, but their need for counter-drugs or "smoothers" isn't quite as frequent as shown in Last Light, as the Gammas by default are implanted with drug-dispensing implants which release the counterdrugs into their systems over a period of several months.
 * Delta Company will be a thing in Daybreak, though it does not yet have much development. Since there is no Spartan-IV program for the immediate future, the pressure to train Delta is higher, and the project might potentially serve as a testbed for future developments. Still, given the loss of Onyx and most of the relevant personnel, as well as the end of the war removing the immediate existential threat and the consequent diverting of funds to reconstruction, what would have been Delta Company will likely diverge considerably from the SPARTAN-III program's original concept. As well, it is likely that only part of the candidates will be trained, with most of them kept in cryostasis indefinitely. As AI-assisted special force infiltration tactics become increasingly important to post-war UNSC doctrine, this may also inform the training of the Delta candidates, and they may serve as prototypes for the next-generation Spartan program.

The Spartan-IIIs' age brackets have been dialed back from Halo: Reach ' s personnel profiles to what was indicated in Ghosts of Onyx, meaning that the overwhelming majority of the candidates fell within the 4-6 year gap upon initiation. This also means we've readjusted some of the Noble Team members' ages to fit that bracket.

The Spartan-IVs, as they appear in 343i canon, do not appear in Daybreak, and neither does the Spartan branch. When the next Spartan program comes about, around the 2580s, it will bear little resemblance to its canon incarnation. But there will still be limitations and sacrifices, whatever form those sacrifices take. The program will also be the product of a different society than before, shaped by new pressures both internal and external. But for now, the UNSC will have to make do with the remaining Spartan-IIs and IIIs (including the new ones of Delta Company). However, the absence of new Spartans doesn't mean an absence of augmented people. The ODST Hoplite program is built on a relatively similar premise as the S-IVs, though hopefully realized in a more balanced way. There will also be an increase in various biological and cybernetic enhancement programs and efforts in both the military and corporate sectors. Though usually not as extensive or holistic as the Spartan augmentations, many of these disparate programs - some of which already operated during the war - will pave way for the next generation of Spartans. And because of the general proliferation of physical augmentations, the new Spartans will have to introduce breakthroughs in some other area to truly be the next generation of supersoldiers.

Finally, nobody's going to be figuring out any pattern in the SPARTAN-II candidates' disappearances or the clones' deaths, ever. 75 children on hundreds of colonies -- even if they were picked from just a couple dozen worlds -- is a statistically insignificant number, and would be drowned out by unrelated disappearances and deaths; and without FTL communications or fully efficient, standardized information-sharing protocols between planetary administrations and/or law enforcement forces, no one would ever be able to pick up on any kind of pattern in the kidnappings, or the flash clone deaths even less so.

Spartan armor



 * MJOLNIR generations are each planned to have a definite look to them, and there's meant to be a clear visual progression from one generation to the next. However, the longer-lasting Marks (particularly IV) do experience internal development that can be roughly split up in terms of major midlife upgrades, some of which come with changes to physical architecture.


 * The MJOLNIR's shield system is now reverse-engineered from Sangheili personal shields, rather than the Kig-Yar gauntlets as indicated in the original Halo novels, to reflect the increased prevalence of Elites since TFoR.


 * MJOLNIR armor remains a lot more rare and expensive than it is in 343i's post-war fiction, and the GEN2 never becomes a thing as such. Following the war, Mark VI will remain the primary MJOLNIR platform for over two decades, though it will in time receive midlife upgrades; remaining Mark V suits and newer variants thereof remain in fairly constant use as well for about a decade, until its unique advantages are incorporated to Mark VI platforms in a midlife update. Overall, the end of the war removes pressure and funding from military technologies, though there are some breakthroughs once the UNSC gathers its bearings.


 * Spartans, in a general sense, look more uniform, if not necessarily 100% uniform. Armor variants are strictly function-based and often switched out on a mission-by-mission basis. They are also much fewer in number; think Reach's style of customization over Halo 4 or 5. Particularly in the post-war era, ad hoc modifications and components kitbashed from other armor systems will abound. For coloration, muted colors - grays, greens, dark blues - are the norm, as well as camouflage coatings and photoreactive pieces to break off one's silhouette.


 * On that note, SPI development will give rise to the MIRAGE Semi-Powered Infiltration Armor in 2554, a kind of final production model of what the SPI suits were prototypes for. It's also what most Spartans post-war will be wearing. It's not quite MJOLNIR in terms of protection or force amplification, but it does the job and is stealthier, cheaper and easier to manufacture - all important to the cash- and resource-strapped postwar UNSC. Select teams of Spartan-IIIs can receive MJOLNIR suits, but they remain fairly exclusive for the time being.


 * The Mark VII will be a melding of MJOLNIR and MIRAGE technologies, along with Covenant-based upgrades and a streamlining of manufacturing processes similar to 343i's GEN2. The fusion of technologies required to make the Mark VII a reality remains "just a few years in the future" until being realized in the 2580s.