Borderlands feats & lore discussion

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

Borderlands is a roleplaying-shooter series. It currently has 3 major games and 3 spinoff games, as well as comics, novels and a movie on the way, along with other spinoffs. Most of the series is set on the distant & dangerous planet of Pandora, where a team of Vault Hunters team up to find and open a mysterious Vault.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

E-Tech weapons convert bullets to energy, which means mass-energy can be applied. Even going with a few grams, it's still in the kilotons. And rocket launcher missiles would weigh in the kgs (megatons).
http://borderlands.wikia.com/wiki/Medical_Mystery:_X-Com-municate/Transcript

Borderlands 2 said:
Dr. Zed: So, it looks like that gun uses Eridium tech to turn bullets inta... stuff that ain't bullets. Energy, and stuff. God damn, Eridium is weird.

Borderlands 2 said:
Dr. Zed: I been doin' some research, and it looks like there's all types of E-tech guns out there for you to find: blaster rifles, plasma cannons, railguns... Sounds dangerously awesome.

Hyperion has control over all the Eridium, and sources it to other weapons manufactures.

Bordlerlands 2 said:
Dr. Zed: Judgin' from this news ECHO I took off one of my patients, it looks like all the weapon manufacturers licensed E-tech from Hyperion for their experimental guns. Guess that explains how Hyperion got so rich off that Eridium after the Vault opened.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

Bullymongs can throw sizable chunks of ice at their enemies. We also see that bullymongs can jump quite well.

Knuckle Dragger lifts and throws a car.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

Hyperion created Helios, a space station the size of a moon.

Helios' moonshots fly from Helios (near the moon of Elpis) to Pandora in seconds.

Sanctuary's shields can withstand these shots.
https://borderlands.wikia.com/wiki/Plan_B/Transcript

Borderlands 2 said:
Lt Davis: Blitz! Look alive, everybody! Hyperion moonshot blitz. Without that fresh core you brought, those lunar mortars woulda punched right through the shield.

Power Loaders can survive being fired from the Moon unscathed.
https://borderlands.wikia.com/wiki/Lock_and_Load/Transcript

Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel said:
Jack: Did the loaders make it down there?

Loader: Status update. We are not dead. Moonshot transport successful.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

The Hyperion forcefields can atomize someone, and the BNK-3R can level a continent.

Borderlands 2 said:
Roland: Vault Hunter. We have a shot at stealing the Vault Key, and stopping Jack from waking the Warrior. All you have to do is get past a forcefield that'll atomize you, destroy a bunker carrying enough firepower to level a continent, and get through a door you can't possibly open.

The missiles used to take out the Hyperion train by Tina Tina can each level a city block.

Borderlands 2: Badonkadonks - Orcz.com, The Video Games Wiki

orcz.com

Borderlands 2 said:
Badonkadonk: An explosive charge powerful enough to level a city block.

Dahl and Atlas (and the other fire arm companies) span many galaxies.

Minecart Mischief/Transcript

At the Abandoned Mining Site in Caustic Caverns, Vault Hunters finds "Old Echo", an ECHO recorder strapped to a pole. Harchek: I will say this only once. Your job is to escort the rock chunk to the mineral smasher, and deliver the Eridium to your supervisor. If you are caught stealing precious...

borderlands.fandom.com

Borderlands 2 said:
Patricia Tannis: Still escorting a minecart due to your egregious over-qualification for menial labor? Fantastic! Let’s hop back to story time. So, the Dahl miners found it difficult to get the Eridium off-planet, and soon found themselves wrestling with the Atlas corporation as they fought over the same resources. As it turns out, word of a Vault can travel many galaxies.

Med hypos turn mass to energy to repair someones body.

Borderlands: Gunsight said:
Mordecai got a med hypo from his outrunner and brought it to Brick, who took it the indifferent way someone else would’ve accepted a drink at a party. The wounds sparkled, as the medicine dissolved the bullets into energy, and used the energy to begin cell repair. Within moments, Brick was healed."

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

A spiderant bursts up through the ground and spins into Clap-Trap hard enough to send him flying.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

Shiv, the first and weakest boss in the game, can tear up the ground considerably with his attacks. Consistent with other low level characters and creatures in the series.

ClapTrap is pulled through a set of thick metal doors with enough force to bend them and survives (I'm pretty sure ClapTrap is way higher than that anyway thanks to the Pre-Sequel, but I say all consistency is good consistency).

There are chunks of what looks like wreckage of the Helios that are far bigger than the colossal rock monoliths scattered around Pandora (Helios was pretty much the size of a moon anyway, but this confirms how big it was, if this is indeed fragments of the Helios).

Vaughn claims to have destroyed mountains, though it's also possible that Vaughn's just crazy, and even if he did we don't know how (Borderlands has better feats in anycase).

This was in the other games, but we see just how huge skaggs can get by the remains of their bones.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

Digistructing is done via taking something apart and putting them back together on a molecular level, and it's even possible to digistruct someone inside a virtual reality.

Someone from a simulation can also be digistructed to the real world, as Vic was.

Ellie points out that digistruct materials are entirely recycled, further backing up molecular manipulation.

Maliwan have digistruct torpedoes that allow their soldiers to be teleported to the battlefield.

Constructor bots can digistruct loaders and fire lasers, so this would scale to them. Could be anywhere between large building to multi-cityblock level (though loaders would be MCB level anyway from withstanding the moonshots, but as I say, the more consistency, the better).

Hyperion have VR worlds which they use for torture.

Said torture simulations involves dismembering people and having their body parts grow back just to do it again.

Tyreen can leech of the powers of others, and by doing so turn them into a husk.

Tyreen stole Liliths siren powers this way, and can use Lilith's Firehawk powers, including teleporting herself and others. She also sustains her former siamese twin Troy through her power.

Tyreen says there are many billions of bandits scattered across the galaxy due to the wars between the gun making corporations.

The Sanctuary flies from Pandora to Promethia in seconds.

Atlas and Maliwan are at war with one another, and there appears to be a broken moon above Promethia.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

Digistructing can also be used to create food, though biomatter is needed to do so. Also, the Sanctuary is powered by bio-fuel, and going by the game, only 10 lifeforms of biomass is needed to power it between star systems.

Quick Change booths are referenced in Lorelai's echo cast, so people are able to digistruct themselves.

A toilet cubicle tanks what is if I remember right a grenede exploding, and both it and the bandit inside are unscathed by it.

Zer0's upgraded sword has a monomonacular edge that can penetrate shields.

Zer0 cuts through a thick metal wall.

The thickness of said wall.

The Sancutary's faster than light travel seems to be done by wormholes.

Brick lifts a blast door.

The thickness of said door.

Maya destroys a blast door.

The thickness of said door.

Maliwan forces claim to be capable of destroying planets.

Tyreen devours the souls of her victims.

Atlas has Viper Drives that allow them to hack into things.

A ratch nest breaks through a concrete wall.

Also this is pretty common, but standard gunfire and meelee attacks are enough to explode people into bloody pieces.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

A mere janitor is able to upload human brains to ratch bodies. The Hyperion New-U also implies it's capable of doing this.

Maya boosted on Eridium says she feels like she could phase-lock an entire planet.

Maliwan machines fly using anti-gravity propulsion.

Atlas have an asteroid mounted laser, the Skywell-27, that was commandeered by Maliwan, which is powered by a Vault Key fragment.

The Skywell-27 can cause country-sized explosions and reach the planet in a fraction of a second.

We also see the laser reach the planet the instant after it's fired. Though no one reacts to this laser, it backs up that lasers in Borderlands are lightspeed, and other examples of laser dodging are legitimate.

On the stations targeting system's accuracry. Also, said laser was designed to destroy asteroids, so Promethia's asteroid field could be natural.

Skywell-27 is very explicitly weaker than the Helios.

There are huge thruster pads built into the asteroids around Skywell-27, for some reason.

The Vault Hunter(s) and Maya fight and kill the Rampager, who destroys multiple huge pillars just by crashing into them and opens up the ceiling in its fight.

We visit the dimension in which the Rampager was sealed. Afterwards, the Vault Hunter(s) are noticably stronger, being able to shatter Eridian.

Tyreen and Troy arrive and consume the power of the Rampager and Maya. The creatures are the power of the Vaults themselves. Which means the Rampager should be comparable in power to the Key, and by proxy at least equal, if not more powerful, than Skywell-27.

After taking Maya's power, Troy says that Maya didn't realise the power she possessed, and he says he feels he could pull the stars down from the sky.

Jakobs has been around for 300 years.

Maliwan Flash Troopers can move faster than the eye and seem to turn into some kind of light itself (or digistruct, but something is happening). There's also a kind of COV fanatic that turns into green light to warp to different places.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

The Calypso Twins can empower their followers with special powers thanks to their Siren abilities, including those they stole from Maya.

Aurelia has nanotech power that allows her to freeze her enemies. Troy mistakes her for a Siren at first.

She can create constructs of ice, mini-tornadoes and cause ice spikes to grow out of the ground by punching it.

The Graveward is the second Vault Monster fought by the BL3 Vault Hunters, and this time they have no exterior help, and defeat it alone. Even beyond it having the power of the Vault & the Vault Key, it tilts the platform the Vault Hunters are standing on and smashes it considerably with its fists.

Within, the Vault Hunters gain the power to attune their minds with eridian artifacts.

Tannis can use her "Siren" (?) powers to telepathically communicate with those in the Vault dimension. So Sirens have not only interstellar range, but also interdimensional range.

Tyreen & Troy then kidnap Tannis and teleport her to Pandora, which is at least several light years away.
Shooting enemies (particularly when you're on a greater level than they are, although this has also happened when enemies are on a similar level) can cause them to explode.

I've also noticed some psychos jump out of the way of bullets, after they've been fired. Even generic badass psychos can rip up the ground like Shiv could.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

Psychos and bandits can dodge bullets.

Even animals like spiderants can also dodge bullets.

Sluggers can jump good.

The Vault Hunters can shatter solid eridium by punching or shooting it.

Even humble farmsteads have antimatter containment chambers.

The bandits have a huge mobile fortress called Carnivora, which is stated to weigh 20,000 tons.

A sense of scale of how big Carnivora is.

Tannis reveals that she's a Siren, having gained her powers from Angel after her death, and slams around the Agonizer 9000. Her power is to connect with and control machines.

Tannis compares the power of first becoming a Siren to electricity to power an entire city running through her body.

Sirens can imbue objects with memories, even unintentionally.

Handsome Jack had Angel connected to the satelites of every planet Hyperion had a hold over.

Angel, and by proxy Tannis, have the power to talk to and control machines.

Angels latent emotions and pain years after her death are powerful enough to restart machines.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

Maliwan forcefields have comparable power to a Catch-A-Ride constructor, given power is rerouted from the former to the later.

Lagromar is a demon found in the Eridium necropolis of Azamak-mur, who repeatedly shakes the considerably large cave system by growling, bringing dust and debris down from the ceiling.

Now at last for the big end of game stuff. Troy uses Eridium to phaselock and charge Elpis, the Moon of Pandora, which is the key to the Great Vault, and Pandora itself being the Great Vault. The beam also moves from Pandora to Elpis in seconds.

Elpis moves visibly in they sky after Troy begins charging it. This is before Troy phaselocks it...

...and this is after.

This is the position of Elpis during the fight with Troy.

Troy says he feels like he's burning brighter than a supernova.

Even after cutting him off from the Eridium, Troy is still able to charge Elpis, as he can take Tyreen's power. Note also that Elpis is even closer now than before.

See also Elpis from where Troy and Tyreen were opening the Great Vault, now noticibly closer than before.

The map marker for the Great Vault notes the Moon is falling. So yes, its position is definitely changing.

The Vault Hunters battle and defeat Troy, who's using Tyreen's power to charge Elpis, though this drains her considerably to the point she feels like she's dying because of it. After Troy is killed, a weakened Tyreen gets up again, shakes the platform and slams some rocks down at the Crimson Raider Sirens, though Ava shields them.

The power within the Vault allows the Vault Hunters to read Eridium.

Pandora itself is the Great Vault, and contains the planet-sized Destroyer.

If the Great Vault is opened, the Destroyer would rip apart Pandora.

We then see the Eridium homeworld for the first time, which was devastated by something in the past, and seems to have Troy's beam leading to Elpis leading right to it.

Typhon de Leon also says that the Destroyers escape puts the entire Universe at risk.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

The Destroyer swallowed stars and gnawed at the edge of galaxies, and its hunger never ceased.

The Eridians took generations to create the Great Vault to trap the Destroyer of unthinkable scope, even as the Destroyer devoured the galaxy.

For a scale of the Eridians work on the Great Vault, Pandora wasn't the only megastructure the Eridians created; they created at least 6 others scattered throughout the galaxy, each with it's own atmosphere and ecosystem. So even though creating megastructures was nothing new to the Eridians, the Great Vault was still considered a monumental undertaking to them.

Eridian Guardians are not bound to individual bodies, and their number is unknown. Nyriad says there are countless Guardians on a hundred worlds.

Some of the Guardians have gained (or were given) self awareness, and improved themselves over time.

The Guardians have souls, which can be captured and harvested.

The Warrior was created by the Eridians to fend off those who would interrupt with the creation of the Great Vault, who wiped out the coup.

Not only are the Great Vault and the Destroyer's true form planet sized, but the Destroyer is an interdimensional horror.

Typhon de Leon says that the Destroyer being unleashed is a threat to the Universe itself.

The Vault opened in Borderlands 1 is a false Vault, intended to feed the Destroyer every 200 years to sedate it.

Pandora's upper mantle is made of solid eridium, with an immense amount of energy surging through it. Nyriad notes that if something goes wrong or the cycle is disrupted, the eridium would force its way to the surface. Given that the previous openings of the Vault failed to disrupt Pandora's surface yet after the Borderlands 1 Vault Hunters Pandora's surface was devastated, I think it's fair enough to say that the actions of the Vault Hunters in Borderlands 1 changed something beyond the usual by defeating the manifestation of the Destroyer.

Pandora's surface, the purple eridium rift being created on the surface after the events of Borderlands 1, which are visible in both the Pre-Sequel and Borderlands 3.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

The Destroyer intergrates the intelligence of those it devours, and understands the knowledge and cultures of its victims, making it all the more difficult to capture. The Eridians sacrificed themselves to trap the Destroyer inside the Great Vault.

Typhon de Leon defeated the Vault Monster on Nekrotafayo.

On Nekrotafayo, there's a machine designed to close the Great Vault, called the Machine.

The Machine uses astrokinetic energy to draw power from the Vaults in order to close the Great Vault.

The Machine is the size of a planet.

The Vaults on other planets power the Machine.

As all the Vaults and the Vault Keys power the Machine which seals Pandora, and the Vault Monsters are the power of the Vaults, this means that each Vault Key would be planet level. So not only would this scale to the Rampager and the Graveward, but also back to the Warrior and Borderlands 2 Vault Hunters, and Handsome Jack.

The Machine is what sealed the Great Vault the first time around.

The Machine has enough power to seal Pandora.

Tannis channels the power of the Machine.

After this, Tannis says that she has mastery over time and space.

Tyreen appears and Typhon tries to take her down with a bomb, but she catches the explosion and deflects it back at him, killing Typhon.

As the Machine works across interstellar distances, Tannis is able to manipulate it to create a portal to Pandora.

The Vault Hunters go through the portal back to Pandora, where Tyreen absorbs part of the Destroyers power and becomes a monster. They defeat her and Lilith regains her powers, but Elpis is still falling, so Lilith sacrifices herself to save Pandora and prevent the Destroyer from truly escaping. Liliths sacrifice puts Elpis back in its place and lights up the entire galaxy (and actually shakes it, if you look at Promethia). Once the light is gone, there's the brand of the Firehawk left scarred on Elpis.

The Eridian artifact in the Vault of the Destroyer allows the Vault Hunters to open up new chaotic shards of reality.

Tannis comments that the Guardian AIs trained themselves either in what are either simulations of more chaotic versions of reality, or outright parallel universes.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

The Borderlands 1 Prima mentions on multiple occassions that the Destroyer if released can destroy the Universe. This is consistent with the events of Borderlands 3.

This powerful being was imprisoned inside the Vault by the Eridians, who sacrificed their entire race to prevent it from consuming our universe.

Angel can see back and forward along the timeline, and the only hope of pushing back the Destroyer to prevent it from destroying the entire dimension is if heroes appear in the right place at the right time who are strong enough to push it back (at least the part of it that escapes through the Vault).

Do you feel that I betrayed you? Do not. I am possed of a sight that allows me to look forward and backwards along the timeline, and the release of this creature was inevitable. There was one one chance for this dimension's continued existence. A hero. Someone who was at the right place, at the right time, and strong enough to push back. I have given you the unique opportunity to defend the existence of all that you know. Go! Fight! Be that hero! I will help you however I can.

Stocking Anarchy · Jul 5, 2022

SATURN is the most powerful and feared Hyperion LOADER.

The Warrior is the most powerful creature Pandora has ever seen (the Destroyers true form was trapped before Pandora was even properly finished). Its body is parts lava and rock, and it can leap high into the sky. It can attack with molten-hot fireballs, and it can control the amount of lava in the Vault. The Warrior obeys all of Handsome Jacks commands, and is 120 feet (36.576m) tall.

Stocking Anarchy · Aug 28, 2023

Storage decks are interdimensional pockets of space-time (from the Borderlands Prima Guide).

Stocking Anarchy · Sep 7, 2023

Frette is able to read an entire book in nanoseconds, and even commented that she finished it 0.3 nanoseconds ago (or 300 picoseconds). Not only that, she said it was 'surprisingly moving,' meaning that she can read the information and process the emotions entailed in that time.

Stocking Anarchy · Sep 14, 2023

Tiny Tina's Wonderland has some very interesting things to add to the lore of Borderlands. Tiny Tina's Wonderland is almost entirely set in a fictional table top game called Bunkers & Badasses (based off a famous TTRPG that you could probably guess), and it has it's own self-aware inhabitants. This is particularly interesting as the game isn't a a computer game or a simulation; it's a boardgame. At the start of the game after choosing your character, Tiny Tina tells you to 'imagine' the world.

The main villain of the game, the Dragon Lord, was forced to be evil by the narrative Tiny Tina told, and he planned to break away from her story and make his own world were everyone in the game could be free. After he's defeated and given up, he tells you to kill him, but instead the Player breaks free of Fate using the Sword of Souls and saves even the Dragon Lord from his undesirable fate (though he still has to go to jail for several centuries for his crimes). This is done with a big beam of energy which breaks out into the real world and affects even the players (Tiny Tina, Valentine and Frette).

In one of the side quests, one of the sidequests has a mage learning to fly. When you get everything you need for him to do so (an alignment shifting artifact), not only does he fly upwards, but he outright hits Valentine in the face in the real world.

Borderlands feats & lore discussion

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous

Marvelous