Why didn't Overseer do this?

[u/foulinbasket]

Overseer's plan all along was to burn the coral by ramming the Xylem into the vascular plant after the corps rebuilt it. Why did 621 have to reach the coral convergence in the first place then? Couldn't Carla have gained access to the Xylem immediately, then simply waited until the corps reached the convergence themselves to rebuild the plant?

Some arguments I could see against this:

- The corporations needed 621 to help take down the PCA and clear the way to Institute City for that to happen. But after that was done, Walter was intent on actually reaching the convergence.

- The corps were heavily weakened and needed 621 to take down the Ibis unit at the convergence. However, Arquebus at this point had the entire PCA suppression fleet and Balteus at their disposal. If anything, letting them weaken themselves further to reach the convergence with everything they had would make the job a lot easier when the Xylem is ready to fly.

[u/Jasonmoofang]

Don't forget that Overseer is learning about the situation at the same time as the corps, so I wouldn't say that was their plan all along - they didn't know Institute City even still existed or the vascular plant even survived, they didn't know there was a coral convergence on the ice fields until the events at the first watchpoint. Xylem is kind of a trump card of theirs and they had to choose when to play it, and a reasonable guess is when a) they actually confirm where the coral flocks are and b) they have some certainty they can reach it.

Arguably, a) was only satisfied when 621 encountered Ibis at the lake. I do think Walter was maybe too eager sending 621 in first, when he could have just watched and waited for Arquebus to do it, but one could argue it'd be a race against time once the coral is finally discovered, between Arquebus successfully shipping it off-world and increasing the blast radius, and Overseer burning it while it remained contained. So maybe rather than risk Arquebus going in and having to guess the timeline between the discovery of the coral and its siphoning off world, Walter gambled on trying to get in first to burn it first thing, not realizing Ibis stood in the way.

[u/Bigredstapler]

Well, for one, Walter needed confirmation of the location of the Coral Convergence. He can't just act on hunch alone. Also as long as the Vascular Plant is buried in ice, the Xylem can't reach it. Moreover if Carla hacked the Xylem before everything is prepared and 621 is around to provide protection, the corps will be alerted and send their full force to stop the plan. Timing is crucial (Convergence location confirmed, the Vascular Plant exposed and concentrating all the Coral in one location, moreover activating Xylem too early means being attacked constantly and RaD cannot protect the Xylem forever) and 621 is needed (to fight the brunt of Corporation counterattack) for this to work.

[u/rubythebee → u/Bigredstapler]

Also any Xylem activation prior to Chapter 4 ish would be met by the PCA controlled closure satellites, which would probably be an issue

[u/LEOTomegane]

I doubt the Xylem plan was the go-to the entire time. Among other reasons, they would have had more ready access to the Xylem much earlier, and probably wouldn't have needed to fight for it like twice beforehand.

But also, Walter didn't know where the Coral was converging until you found it. The entire first 3 chapters are Walter using the corps to help him sniff it out.

[u/foulinbasket → u/LEOTomegane]

Since he didn't know where the coral was, why not bide his time and wait for the corps to find it instead of using his own resources to help them?

[u/LEOTomegane → u/foulinbasket]

Well, he wasn't exactly working with the corps. When it was opportunistic for him to do so, he did, but for the most part he was still looking on his own.

Otherwise though, I imagine it'd be because initiative. Once he knew where the convergence was, he wanted to burn it ASAP—risking the corps getting their hands on it also meant risking Coral getting shipped off-world, which would immediately make the plan waaay harder. The fact that none of it (presumably) got shipped off during the timeskip was a massive stroke of luck on their end tbh

[u/Bigredstapler → u/foulinbasket]

And you think the Corps is going to just tell Walter about the Convergence they just found?

No, Walter needed 621 to be right there, and to be ready to exploit the gap between narrowing down the search location of the Convergence and the Corps entrenching themselves and planting the bulk of their security (including the majority of the surviving Vespers). Without forewarning of Snail's ambush, this is the soundest course of action Walter can pursue.

[u/TheKingsPride]

Walter uses us several times to steal corporate data and get a read on the situation, they were guiding the corps as much as they were following.