Halo 4

Ok so we defeated the convenant, we stopped the flood... Now what? I heard something about Forerunners. How do you think they will be? Are we only fighting Forerunners? Is there different variations of them (As how covenant had elites,grunts, brutes, ect). What do they look like? Also please don't just link a wiki page, I would like to discuss it.

The Flood didn't die.

Gravemind was destroyed, which temporarily hampered their intelligence. However, flood still exists in the galaxy and if it ever gets out and contaminates a new planet, they could reproduce a new Gravemind.

My bet is on it being The Timeless One.

It's possible the Precursor is still alive. I wouldn't be surprised if he had something to do with the Flood in the first place.

From my understanding, the Precursors were a type 0 technology-advanced civilization that created the Forerunners. The Forerunners then turned on the Precursors because they felt they were the protectors of the galaxy. They destroyed the majority of the Precursors, with the exception of one (that we know). That's The Timeless One.

Then the Forerunners built massive stellar structures and eliminated their warrior-class because they had blind confidence in their technology and were determined to maintain a peaceful stance. That is why they were weak against the Flood when it was discovered.

Humanity existed when the Forerunners lived in the galaxy, but they weren't as advanced as the Forerunners. Humanity and some other race united when they encountered the Flood. They managed to maintain and quarantine a couple of planets, but then discovered the Forerunners and met resistance. The Forerunners believed the humans were a hostile and violent species, so they devolved humanity. Humanity was spared because of a Forerunner called The Liberian.

Later on, the Forerunners met with the Flood. They at first thought it was a simple parasite, but later learned that it was intelligent and cunning. They created the Halos in order to eliminate the majority of life in the galaxy, in order to starve out the Flood.

I don't really understand why the Forerunners decided it was best to activate the rings, but the majority of the Halo series revolves around the fact that even though they activated the rings and destroyed themselves, the Flood managed to survive (they left humanity untouched in a far corner of the galaxy, on Earth). Perhaps they knew the rings would only stall the Flood or they took a gamble and failed to completely stare the Flood.

Gravemind was such a manipulator that he managed to convince Mendicant-Bias (I think that's how you spell it), a sentinel created specifically to eradicate the Flood, that he would be better off joining the Flood's cause because it was a utopian future for the world and completely inevitable. The Flood's desire is to eliminate all conscious beings on the planet and turn them into space zombies.
---
And if you listen very hard, the truth will come to you at last, when all are one and one is all, to be a rock and not to roll.

Spoilers and answers ahead. Most info from Primordium.

.
.
.
.
.

The Timeless One and the Captive are the same person, and is a Precursor. The Didact/Bornstellar fusion met with and destroyed it. You learn that the Precursor are effectively an ageless race, having a lifespan of hundreds of millions of years. You also learn that the Timeless One is a Gravemind, and that all Precursors were Graveminds. The Flood is effectively infant Precursors, and the Flood/Precursor are in its own words "one and the same."

Installation 07 has 10 Graveminds/Precursors in stasis on it, and that is where the Guilty Spark fragment the UNSC recovered is taking the ship he hijacked, along with all onboard UNSC personell. Because that is where the Librarian is, who apparently did not die.

Also, ONI apparently opened and/or conversed with the occupants of the pods that were not Team Katana recovered from Onyx. They refer to one of them informing them of things, and calls it the Bornstellar Relation. So the UNSC may have in its posession as many as three Forerunner.

So, the enemy is going to be the Flood/Precursor and possibly Forerunner holdouts as well. Plus, you can assume that the Covenant races will make an appearance, likely as allies of opportunity. 343i won't just leave those iconic enemies behind them. They already set the stage for us working with other races in Glasslands, where Brutes, Humans, Grunts, and Jackals all have a presence on this distant colony world, and maintain an uneasy peace. Even so far as all visiting one city at least.

.
.
.
.
.
.

Also, Oedipus, you're massively incorrect about Ghosts of Onyx/Reach back on the Reach forum. Link for your convinience.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/960512-halo-reach/61616492

============

Edit: Also, Didact is not unstoppable. As the original was captured and executed, I doubt the blend of Didact and Bornsteller will fair any better than the original. Also, Humanity was the nigh equal of Forerunner, by the Didacts own words. Also, according to the Didact, the Forerunner had little answer to many of the Human Empire's weaponry, and it was only the fact that Humanity had been waging a second war that things ended the way they did.

Did you read the novels?
---
FernieODST - Its like watching two giraffes fight; It's completely life threatening and important to them, but viewed from an onlooker its just derpa derp derp.