Student Question
In Ender's Game, which direction is the enemy's gate and why is its location significant?
Quick answer:
In "Ender's Game," the enemy's gate is "down," a strategic orientation in the zero-gravity Battle Room. This approach unifies soldiers' perspectives and offers tactical advantages. Ender realizes most commanders treat the enemy gate as directly in front, based on corridor gravity. By thinking of the enemy as "down," his army "drops in" on opponents, minimizing their exposure and simulating planetary attacks, crucial for the final battle at Command School.
The enemy's gate is "down." This of course refers to the Battle Room at Battle School and a tactical approach to re-orienting all soldiers so they have a common goal and a common sense of direction in a cubical room which contains no gravity.
While at Battle School, Ender quickly realizes that most commanders rely on the direction of gravity as it was in the corridor when they enter the Battle Room. This means that most of the time the enemy gate is directly "in front" of their gate. What Ender proposes when he instructs his army to imagine the enemy as "down" is genius. First, they immediately "drop in" on the enemy, presenting only their feet as moving targets, which are very small and hard to hit. Second, and most important for later, this "dropping in" on the enemy simulates the attack of a planet from space. No matter what part of the planet his army would "land on" they would all have to move "downward" to reach it. This proves to be the exact solution to the final battle on The Simulator when Ender is at Command School.
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