Incorrect.  The difference is this: members of a hivemind ONLY have a collective consciousness.  The Unity collective consciousness is in ADDITION to their normal individual thinking/reasoning capacity.  See the difference?  In the case of the hivemind you can't very well disobey or disagree with the collective consciousness  as it is your brain.  By contrast the Unity may have a great influence on an individual, but at the end of the day they make their own decisions.

now that said, the average Advent Adult has spent their entire life being brainwashed with with Unity propaganda and Philosophy which among other things may lead them to give their collective consciousness  a lot of sway in their decision making process- But that makes them a religious fanatic, not the victim of mind control. 

I don't remember who, but in one of those "what is chasing the Vasari?" threads somebody theorized that the corruptive influence within the Unity was fury at the TEC passed down through generations, which colored everything they did from that point on. Since the Unity is a collective consciousness, others could theoretically feel that emotion, even if they didn't completely agree with it, and pass it on to others, and so on and so forth. And so basically the Rebels see this and want to return to seeking enlightenment rather than vengeance.

LOL the advent are not under mind control, they just have a sort of collective conscience or "hive" mind as you might say. But the people are still individuals and can disagree with others. Its just that usually the leaders are the ones who make decisions using this collective mindset. But apparently after 30 years of war, some sectors got too pissed or something and rebelled against their leaders, creating a new collective conscience if u will.

One thing I would like to point out, is that the Advent Rebels left because of their devotion to the Unity, not because they've fractured away from it....  According to the upgraded players manual, the Rebels feel the Unity has become corrupted, and that this sickness should be purged...  So in many ways they could be looked at not as "rebels", but as much more fanatical members of the unity than the Loyalists....  So this apparently didn't spawn from a desire to seperate the Unity, which a hive mind could prevent... ... it spawned from a fanatical devotion to the Unity, and a willingness to do anything, even purging the loyalists, to preserve it.... which in turn might have been caused by having too many fanatics all hooked up to a hive mind..... 

In a story called "The Long Chase",  one of the last free minds in the solar system is fleeing from a huge group mind.  She believes that her freedom of thought will be taken from her.  When she realizes that escape is futile, she alters her mindset to not be averse to being assimilated.  She is brought in, and realizes that each individual is still themselves, but connected to everyone else.

This is what the Unity is.

In Orsan Scott Card's "Ender's Game", as well as all connected stories that come after, The Formics are an alien race which has Hive Queens, the egg laying brain of a hive, and the workers, essentially the Queen's extended body, for they may not resist her will.  If they do, they die.

This is a Hive Mind.

See the difference?

OK, this is just fiction on my part... but wouldn't it make a cool story about the Advent Rebels if that's what happened?  A portion of the original Advent group mind somehow seperated and morphed or corrupted into a hive mind???   That would make them a little more scary...

Meh. I don't find the Advent truly terrifying (of course I'm not a TEC soldier), and I don't think the Devs want to make them that way. If you're going to make humans have a hive mind, an idea disturbing to most people, then at least go the whole way like the Borg.

I'm factoring in the telepathic part...  this is what scares me.  They might be physically weaker than the collective, but if a hive of telepaths could all be controlled and channeled thru one queen, it makes for some interesting possibilities.  Telepathic borg.... not only able assimilate a body, but now also a mind, perhaps from a distance???   Tap into someone's brain and mentally connect them to the hive against their will, from half a continant, or half a solar system, away?

to be honest the Advent reminded me of the Protoss from starcraft. They have what amounts to a telepathic net that allows them to have a collective consciousnesses...least that's the impression I got from reading it. while they are linked to each other they also have individual thought and free-will. I figured the AL are like the Aiur Protoss and the AR are like the Shakuras Protoss who, while retaining their teleptathy, remain as completly separate beings.

Oh, I should ad, I mean terrifying as a very high compliment... and I suppose mostly from a TEC soldiers POV.... 

Of the three races, I love the concept of the Advent the most, and I do find them the most terrifying of the three... so to speak.  I've played a lot of games against aliens, but the idea of a seperate human race... well, sort of human at this point... "The Deviants from our past..."  OK, I love this idea, and making them a female dominated society as well as physic... that itself would be a huge psylogical threat to a mostly male dominated TEC military command, which I'm assuming form the movies and such it probably is...  that's a nice touch.

It's the idea that most of their power isn't physical, but mental, that I admire most, and find the most frightning, from an enemies point of view.  It's just good Sci-Fi, written into a very well made game... bwaahahahaha