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[Nightwriter]

JMA22TB wrote...

I'm starting to wonder if the whole Collector threat was just a distraction by the Reapers to lure Shepard out of their way so they could work on a separate project. I don't have any proof but here's my idea:

-Redemption shows Harbinger witnessing Shepard's body being taken at the last possible moment. It's safe to say that its plan to harvest humanity spawned immediately afterward, since hundreds of thousands of colonists were taken by the time Shepard woke up.

-The Collectors showed they have an intelligence network with the trap they laid on their ship, so they probably knew Cerberus was reviving Shepard. I have a theory as to how they knew and how TIM was tracking the Collectors so efficiently.
Miranda was in charge of the Lazarus project but she was just the director - Wilson was the chief medical guy. Nothing suggests in the current galactic community that people can revive or animate sapient beings except Warlord Okeer, who had to make a deal with the Collectors to obtain the data. It looks like it took him a long time to get that done too, so maybe that's where TIM got the idea - 2 years sounds like the amount of time it would take to trial and error your way into growing the perfect specimen. So with that in mind, here's what I think happened:

Sovereign's destruction presented an opportunity to TIM, who ordered an excavation team to find any useful data. At the same time, he was closely observing the Shepard recovery team with Miranda and Feron, who were successful. The Collectors wanting to obtain Shepard is suspicious, so he starts scouring for leads regarding them, leading to Okeer and his 'perfect krogan' experiment. The last part is the speculation but it fits: he orders Wilson to contact the Collectors to find out how to bring a human back from the dead, telling him to be very discreet and to not rouse suspicion. If they wanted to know why, he'd pretend it was his wife or some lost family member.

Miranda recovers the body, Wilson gets to work, and TIM focuses his attention on re-building the Normandy, using his portfolio and Alliance backers to access the materials in the way EDI described late in the game. Wilson's contact with the Collectors is monitored by TIM and he has him contact them multiple times so he can ascertain what's going on with the colony abductions, although they don't give him any proof.

As the project is right on the verge of being completed, Wilson hears about the abductions and assumes the Collectors are involved, making him feel very worried about his involvement with them - what if they find out what he's doing? Will they target him, his family? He starts freaking out and looking for more money from Miranda and TIM so he can get out of Dodge, then loses it entirely, activating the mechs and trying to destroy the facility and Shepard to protect himself, looking to take the shuttle out and disappear. Of course, we know what happens and he fails.

While TIM couldn't get any hard evidence from the Collectors in that span, he knows that's who is most likely responsible because he knows they wanted Shepard's body and (in this theory) gave Wilson the means to bring back the dead - they're advanced, no one can reach their homeworld, and require 'samples' in their exchanges. The patterns are there, as he said. He was confident Shepard could find evidence quickly and was right, immediately devoting all resources to tracking the Collectors.

Dude. Omg. That would be epic. I'd never see that coming.

I can just see Harbinger making the plan.

WE SHALL FEED THE HUMAN SHEPARD A RIDICULOUS DIVERSION
STORY.

WE'LL MAKE THE IDIOT BELIEVE WE'RE ABDUCTING HUMANS TO
MAKE A REAPER OUT OF HUMAN SMOOTHIE GOO OR SOMETHING.

NO, NO, THEY WILL TOTALLY BUY IT, JUST WATCH. IT'S SO FREAKING
RIDICULOUS THEY'LL EAT IT UP, THE IDIOTS.

Modifié par Nightwriter, 15 avril 2010 - 05:07 .

[smudboy]

Nightwriter wrote...
Dude. Omg. That would be epic. I'd never see that coming.

I can just see Harbinger making the plan.

WE SHALL FEED THE HUMAN SHEPARD A RIDICULOUS DIVERSION
STORY.

WE'LL MAKE THE IDIOT BELIEVE WE'RE ABDUCTING HUMANS TO
MAKE A REAPER OUT OF HUMAN SMOOTHIE GOO OR SOMETHING.

NO, NO, THEY WILL TOTALLY BUY IT, JUST WATCH. IT'S SO FREAKING
RIDICULOUS THEY'LL EAT IT UP, THE IDIOTS.

That could work.

When it comes to crazy, incomprehensible stories, when motives and events aren't explained, I take what many of my Russian creative writing classmates would say: "I thought every character was on drugs."

My current belief is that Harbinger is some rogue AI, insane, or just playing with his dolls.  It's the only way I can help explain the galactic mess that is ME2.

Modifié par smudboy, 15 avril 2010 - 05:15 .

[Nightwriter]

smudboy wrote...

That could work.

When it comes to crazy, incomprehensible stories, when motives and events aren't explained, I take what many of my Russian creative writing classmates would say: "I thought every character was on drugs."

I tried to think of a reply to this but all I could do was laugh.

And laugh.

[JMA22TB]

I just finished it all up - including a contingency plan that Sovereign may have implemented so that if the Citadel plan didn't work.



Yeah, the whole plan just reeks of a diversion to me - a really dangerous one that requires a lot of intel on TIM's part and the best technology and ship the galaxy has to offer, but still a diversion.



I don't think the Collector Base, at least in this context, would be the silver bullet it seems like, because I'm pretty sure the Collectors are the Reaper-implanted version of the pinnacle of Prothean military and R&D. Sure, the tech is advanced but I don't think the decision to keep it alone is going to completely throw the balance of power in our direction if we keep it.



There has to be something like this going on because why else would the entire Reaper fleet activate and move in the galaxy's direction after the Collectors were wiped out?

[Solomen]

tonnactus wrote...

Solomen wrote...

Only the minority of the krogans that had blood rage survived a nuclear holocaust

Bottleneck

Wrong.They still adapt so fast that the salarians had to make a new version of the genophage.It wouldnt be necessary if the krogans that survive the nuclear war are "battlenecks".

You do realize only the krogans resistant to genophage are breeding right?  This did occur to you right?

[Nightwriter]

JMA22TB wrote...

I just finished it all up - including a contingency plan that Sovereign may have implemented so that if the Citadel plan didn't work.

Yeah, the whole plan just reeks of a diversion to me - a really dangerous one that requires a lot of intel on TIM's part and the best technology and ship the galaxy has to offer, but still a diversion.

I don't think the Collector Base, at least in this context, would be the silver bullet it seems like, because I'm pretty sure the Collectors are the Reaper-implanted version of the pinnacle of Prothean military and R&D. Sure, the tech is advanced but I don't think the decision to keep it alone is going to completely throw the balance of power in our direction if we keep it.

There has to be something like this going on because why else would the entire Reaper fleet activate and move in the galaxy's direction after the Collectors were wiped out?

But a diversion to distract us from what?

Something else that's been going on in the galaxy they don't want us paying too much attention to? Something small, on the side, we might toss up as puzzling but not top priority? The dark energy matter, perhaps?

[JMA22TB]

smudboy wrote...

Nightwriter wrote...
Dude. Omg. That would be epic. I'd never see that coming.

I can just see Harbinger making the plan.

WE SHALL FEED THE HUMAN SHEPARD A RIDICULOUS DIVERSION
STORY.

WE'LL MAKE THE IDIOT BELIEVE WE'RE ABDUCTING HUMANS TO
MAKE A REAPER OUT OF HUMAN SMOOTHIE GOO OR SOMETHING.

NO, NO, THEY WILL TOTALLY BUY IT, JUST WATCH. IT'S SO FREAKING
RIDICULOUS THEY'LL EAT IT UP, THE IDIOTS.

That could work.

When it comes to crazy, incomprehensible stories, when motives and events aren't explained, I take what many of my Russian creative writing classmates would say: "I thought every character was on drugs."

My current belief is that Harbinger is some rogue AI, insane, or just playing with his dolls.  It's the only way I can help explain the galactic mess that is ME2.

Having time to reflect on the flaws in the 'plan' they had, it makes no sense that

-they'd start harvesting humanity with the obvious consequence that the establishment would find out - regardless of sticking to the lawless part of the galaxy, they were going to be discovered at some point, there's no other conclusion.
-Harbinger didn't seem to know, despite tracking Shepard and very nearly obtaining his body in Redemption, what was going on and first ran into newly revived Shepard on Horizon for the first time? This would suggest that it just gave up looking once Liara and Feron ran off with the body right in front of him. I call bull****. There's something else going on.
-The Base was not fortified to protect against an assault in any way, shape or form, and only had one cruiser in its defense, the only cruiser they have I think. If the Reapers really wanted this project to be successful they would have recruited allies to help defend it, like they did the geth in ME... Oh yeah, speaking of the heretic geth, if they are an arm of the Reapers that has to be rewritten by Legion so that they don't brainwash the rest of them, where were they in the course of the story? It's very fishy.

It's like the Collectors were escorting Shepard to the Collector Base, not protecting it.

A well-planned diversion certainly would be fitting to what Vigil said about the Reapers being patient and calculating, and as insane as the plan is it was working up until Shepard got involved. It's a bit of mockery on Harbinger's part too, because none of the other Reapers look like that and pretty much all sapient life in this game, including what we saw of the Protheans, suggest that spacefaring civilizations are mostly humanoid. The Reaper ships look like cuttlefish.

It just makes sense that while they were fooling around with the human harvesting diversion, they were allocating the heretic geth or another group we don't know about that they've bent to their will, to give them a means to re-enter the galaxy outside of the Citadel that's outside of its network, baiting Shepard along so that he has no way of knowing or being able to stop the real plan.

[JMA22TB]

Nightwriter wrote...

JMA22TB wrote...

I just finished it all up - including a contingency plan that Sovereign may have implemented so that if the Citadel plan didn't work.

Yeah, the whole plan just reeks of a diversion to me - a really dangerous one that requires a lot of intel on TIM's part and the best technology and ship the galaxy has to offer, but still a diversion.

I don't think the Collector Base, at least in this context, would be the silver bullet it seems like, because I'm pretty sure the Collectors are the Reaper-implanted version of the pinnacle of Prothean military and R&D. Sure, the tech is advanced but I don't think the decision to keep it alone is going to completely throw the balance of power in our direction if we keep it.

There has to be something like this going on because why else would the entire Reaper fleet activate and move in the galaxy's direction after the Collectors were wiped out?

But a diversion to distract us from what?

Something else that's been going on in the galaxy they don't want us paying too much attention to? Something small, on the side, we might toss up as puzzling but not top priority? The dark energy matter, perhaps?

Modified my theory post at the end to put in my idea about the heretic geth building a separate mass relay that connects to dark space between stars, like Heretic station was built. It makes total sense because if the geth were really allies of the Reapers and they wanted the human slurpie project to work, why weren't the millions of geth on the Heretic station dispatched? Geth are the perfect manual labor force - dispensible, easy to produce, and can work in any condition.

[Solomen]

What if they weren't building a reaper? What if they were building a Shepard on a reaper platform?

[Nightwriter]

JMA22TB wrote...

Modified my theory post at the end to put in my idea about the heretic geth building a separate mass relay that connects to dark space between stars, like Heretic station was built. It makes total sense because if the geth were really allies of the Reapers and they wanted the human slurpie project to work, why weren't the millions of geth on the Heretic station dispatched? Geth are the perfect manual labor force - dispensible, easy to produce, and can work in any condition.

By "dispatched", do you mean killed, or deployed?

I'll guess you mean deployed.

It has occurred to me that geth lack the necessary skills or capabilities to perform scientific studies/intensive gene modification, or that they'd need to at least be trained or programmed with the necessary knowledge - whereas the Collectors were already available and qualified for the task.

What do you think? It is a good point you have, good enough that I've given it a lot of thought.

Modifié par Nightwriter, 15 avril 2010 - 05:55 .

[JMA22TB]

Solomen wrote...

What if they weren't building a reaper? What if they were building a Shepard on a reaper platform?

I don't think it really matters what they were doing - it wasn't meant to work. If they wanted it to, there'd be at least a couple thousand geth dispatched to help protect the Base, since they are a brainwashed (if you can call it that) ally of the Reapers, not to mention a modification to the Omega 4 Relay so that the Normandy would explode on arrival, and the installation of anti-ship defenses, alarm systems, and the production of more cruisers to defend themselves.

I think it was a diversion; it still required a ton of intel and resources to foil the abductions, as well as an elite team, EDI, and Shepard, but this clearly wasn't the real plan to me.

[Solomen]

Nightwriter wrote...

JMA22TB wrote...

Modified my theory post at the end to put in my idea about the heretic geth building a separate mass relay that connects to dark space between stars, like Heretic station was built. It makes total sense because if the geth were really allies of the Reapers and they wanted the human slurpie project to work, why weren't the millions of geth on the Heretic station dispatched? Geth are the perfect manual labor force - dispensible, easy to produce, and can work in any condition.

By "dispatched", do you mean killed, or deployed?

I'll guess you mean deployed.

It has occurred to me that geth lack the necessary skills or capabilities to perform scientific studies/intensive gene modification, or that they'd need to be at least be trained or programmed with the necessary knowledge - whereas the Collectors were already available and qualified for the task.

What do you think? It is a good point you have, good enough that I've given it a lot of thought.

The reapers also don't trust geth...  They're just going to eradicate them all when they get the chance.  Why give them access to technology that could bite them in their dreadnaught sized collective butts

[Solomen]

JMA22TB wrote...

Solomen wrote...

What if they weren't building a reaper? What if they were building a Shepard on a reaper platform?

I don't think it really matters what they were doing - it wasn't meant to work. If they wanted it to, there'd be at least a couple thousand geth dispatched to help protect the Base, since they are a brainwashed (if you can call it that) ally of the Reapers, not to mention a modification to the Omega 4 Relay so that the Normandy would explode on arrival, and the installation of anti-ship defenses, alarm systems, and the production of more cruisers to defend themselves.

I think it was a diversion; it still required a ton of intel and resources to foil the abductions, as well as an elite team, EDI, and Shepard, but this clearly wasn't the real plan to me.

Reapers wouldn't want Geth anywhere near that base

[JMA22TB]

Nightwriter wrote...

JMA22TB wrote...

Modified my theory post at the end to put in my idea about the heretic geth building a separate mass relay that connects to dark space between stars, like Heretic station was built. It makes total sense because if the geth were really allies of the Reapers and they wanted the human slurpie project to work, why weren't the millions of geth on the Heretic station dispatched? Geth are the perfect manual labor force - dispensible, easy to produce, and can work in any condition.

By "dispatched", do you mean killed, or deployed?

I'll guess you mean deployed.

It has occurred to me that geth lack the necessary skills or capabilities to perform scientific studies/intensive gene modification, or that they'd need to at least be trained or programmed with the necessary knowledge - whereas the Collectors were already available and qualified for the task.

What do you think? It is a good point you have, good enough that I've given it a lot of thought.

Lol whoops I meant deployed.

I think they'd just be there for defense, assuming the Reapers wanted to defend the base. I mean all they did in that capacity was send a cruiser after you and construct a couple Oculi? Legion mentioned there are millions of geth in the Heretic station on standby waiting to be deployed - and the Reapers didn't use them to ensure the slurpie project's success?

If they did that, you'd be walking into a death trap, with geth, Collectors, the swarms, armaments, and a fleet guarding the base - with no idea what you were getting into. A real suicide mission. It's still as suicide mission but the one I describe would be pretty close to impossible to pull off.

So my guess is that the Reapers used the heretic geth to construct a mass relay connecting to dark space that is off the Citadel grid, between stars so no one can find it, and doesn't require activation of the master control unit we had to use to stop the Reapers in ME. Rewriting or destroying the heretics would be a really important decision for ME3 in that context, eliminating an ally and possibly halting the completion of the construction. If you did that in ME2, I would set it up where the entire Reaper fleet isn't able to make it through the relay before it shorts out, destroying or isolating a large number of them.

[JMA22TB]

Solomen wrote...

JMA22TB wrote...

Solomen wrote...

What if they weren't building a reaper? What if they were building a Shepard on a reaper platform?

I don't think it really matters what they were doing - it wasn't meant to work. If they wanted it to, there'd be at least a couple thousand geth dispatched to help protect the Base, since they are a brainwashed (if you can call it that) ally of the Reapers, not to mention a modification to the Omega 4 Relay so that the Normandy would explode on arrival, and the installation of anti-ship defenses, alarm systems, and the production of more cruisers to defend themselves.

I think it was a diversion; it still required a ton of intel and resources to foil the abductions, as well as an elite team, EDI, and Shepard, but this clearly wasn't the real plan to me.

Reapers wouldn't want Geth anywhere near that base

If that were the case, why did Sovereign want the geth to escort him to the Citadel and accompany Saren in finding the location of the Conduit? If they wanted to protect the base, they would have deployed the millions of geth on Heretic station. They clearly can pick up on stealth systems, so they'd have the geth attack as soon as you enter the galactic core.

[Solomen]

JMA22TB wrote...

Solomen wrote...

JMA22TB wrote...

Solomen wrote...

What if they weren't building a reaper? What if they were building a Shepard on a reaper platform?

I don't think it really matters what they were doing - it wasn't meant to work. If they wanted it to, there'd be at least a couple thousand geth dispatched to help protect the Base, since they are a brainwashed (if you can call it that) ally of the Reapers, not to mention a modification to the Omega 4 Relay so that the Normandy would explode on arrival, and the installation of anti-ship defenses, alarm systems, and the production of more cruisers to defend themselves.

I think it was a diversion; it still required a ton of intel and resources to foil the abductions, as well as an elite team, EDI, and Shepard, but this clearly wasn't the real plan to me.

Reapers wouldn't want Geth anywhere near that base

If that were the case, why did Sovereign want the geth to escort him to the Citadel and accompany Saren in finding the location of the Conduit? If they wanted to protect the base, they would have deployed the millions of geth on Heretic station. They clearly can pick up on stealth systems, so they'd have the geth attack as soon as you enter the galactic core.

Sovereign used the geth as pawns.  It fully intended to destroy them once the portal was open. 

[Nightwriter]

Solomen wrote...

The reapers also don't trust geth...  They're just going to eradicate them all when they get the chance.  Why give them access to technology that could bite them in their dreadnaught sized collective butts

Oh, yeah, that does make sense. The Reapers never liked using the geth anyway, Sovereign only did it because he had to.

And JMA, possibly the reason Sovereign took so many geth with him to attack the Citadel was because he needed them in a pinch. He needed an invasion force.

He probably couldn't use the Collectors for that, they wouldn't be well suited to it. There may not be enough of them for them to survive a full on assault and still be useful later for their Reaper making purposes.

[phordicus]

JMA22TB wrote...
Legion mentioned there are millions of geth in the Heretic station on standby waiting to be deployed - and the Reapers didn't use them to ensure the slurpie project's success?

legion is 1000+ geth himself.  the actual number of geth "platforms" is much less.

[adamm24680]

I agree with the OP, and

JKoopman wrote...

Honestly, I've got a lot of problems with ME2 but the trainwreck that was the ending revelation overshadows them all. Suddenly the Reapers went from being a badass race of ancient artificially intelligent machines that can only just barely be destroyed by the combined fleets of the entire Council to a race of sentient "biomechanical" organisms grown from the organic soup of lesser beings that can now be destroyed by a single guy with a machinegun. Way to turn the greatest threat in the galaxy into a bunch of pansies, BioWare...

Man, this is exactly how I felt after finishing ME2, I was so disappointed, all the Cthulhu&stuff feel has disappeared.

[JMA22TB]

Solomen wrote...

JMA22TB wrote...

Solomen wrote...

JMA22TB wrote...

Solomen wrote...

What if they weren't building a reaper? What if they were building a Shepard on a reaper platform?

I don't think it really matters what they were doing - it wasn't meant to work. If they wanted it to, there'd be at least a couple thousand geth dispatched to help protect the Base, since they are a brainwashed (if you can call it that) ally of the Reapers, not to mention a modification to the Omega 4 Relay so that the Normandy would explode on arrival, and the installation of anti-ship defenses, alarm systems, and the production of more cruisers to defend themselves.

I think it was a diversion; it still required a ton of intel and resources to foil the abductions, as well as an elite team, EDI, and Shepard, but this clearly wasn't the real plan to me.

Reapers wouldn't want Geth anywhere near that base

If that were the case, why did Sovereign want the geth to escort him to the Citadel and accompany Saren in finding the location of the Conduit? If they wanted to protect the base, they would have deployed the millions of geth on Heretic station. They clearly can pick up on stealth systems, so they'd have the geth attack as soon as you enter the galactic core.

Sovereign used the geth as pawns.  It fully intended to destroy them once the portal was open. 

So are the Collectors. The fact is if the Reapers wanted the Collector "plan" to be successful they would have made coming through the Omega 4 Relay a deathtrap filled with geth and Collectors, not a considerably less dangerous situation like we saw in ME2.

Modifié par JMA22TB, 15 avril 2010 - 07:11 .

[JMA22TB]

Nightwriter wrote...

Solomen wrote...

The reapers also don't trust geth...  They're just going to eradicate them all when they get the chance.  Why give them access to technology that could bite them in their dreadnaught sized collective butts

Oh, yeah, that does make sense. The Reapers never liked using the geth anyway, Sovereign only did it because he had to.

And JMA, possibly the reason Sovereign took so many geth with him to attack the Citadel was because he needed them in a pinch. He needed an invasion force.

He probably couldn't use the Collectors for that, they wouldn't be well suited to it. There may not be enough of them for them to survive a full on assault and still be useful later for their Reaper making purposes.

Exactly. The geth were a military tool which is why they would also be deployed at the Collector base - defend the project and make sure no one messes with it. Assuming the project was meant to be completed, which I don't believe it was.

[BaladasDemnevanni]

JMA22TB wrote...

Solomen wrote...

JMA22TB wrote...

Solomen wrote...

JMA22TB wrote...

Solomen wrote...

What if they weren't building a reaper? What if they were building a Shepard on a reaper platform?

I don't think it really matters what they were doing - it wasn't meant to work. If they wanted it to, there'd be at least a couple thousand geth dispatched to help protect the Base, since they are a brainwashed (if you can call it that) ally of the Reapers, not to mention a modification to the Omega 4 Relay so that the Normandy would explode on arrival, and the installation of anti-ship defenses, alarm systems, and the production of more cruisers to defend themselves.

I think it was a diversion; it still required a ton of intel and resources to foil the abductions, as well as an elite team, EDI, and Shepard, but this clearly wasn't the real plan to me.

Reapers wouldn't want Geth anywhere near that base

If that were the case, why did Sovereign want the geth to escort him to the Citadel and accompany Saren in finding the location of the Conduit? If they wanted to protect the base, they would have deployed the millions of geth on Heretic station. They clearly can pick up on stealth systems, so they'd have the geth attack as soon as you enter the galactic core.

Sovereign used the geth as pawns.  It fully intended to destroy them once the portal was open. 

So are the Collectors. The fact is if the Reapers wanted the Collector "plan" to be successful they would have made coming through the Omega 4 Relay a deathtrap filled with geth and Collectors, not a considerably less dangerous situation like we saw in ME2.

My only problem with this approach is how difficult it was to reach the Collector Base in the first place. We know that a Reaper IFF is needed to cross beyond the Omega IV relay, which was extremely difficult to come by. So they had no reason to set up massive defenses. Only other approach I could see is Reapers 'planting' the dead reaper. But if they were already close enough to plant it, why not just continue the invasion?

Modifié par BaladasDemnevanni, 15 avril 2010 - 07:17 .

[Solomen]

JMA22TB wrote...

Nightwriter wrote...

Solomen wrote...

The reapers also don't trust geth...  They're just going to eradicate them all when they get the chance.  Why give them access to technology that could bite them in their dreadnaught sized collective butts

Oh, yeah, that does make sense. The Reapers never liked using the geth anyway, Sovereign only did it because he had to.

And JMA, possibly the reason Sovereign took so many geth with him to attack the Citadel was because he needed them in a pinch. He needed an invasion force.

He probably couldn't use the Collectors for that, they wouldn't be well suited to it. There may not be enough of them for them to survive a full on assault and still be useful later for their Reaper making purposes.

Exactly. The geth were a military tool which is why they would also be deployed at the Collector base - defend the project and make sure no one messes with it. Assuming the project was meant to be completed, which I don't believe it was.

The geth were a potential rival.  The reapers may have used them at the citadel as shock troops but that was because shortly afterward they would destroy them all
Now that the citadel plan has fallen through the reapers cannot afford the geth becoming more advanced.

The collectors have no potential to rise up against the reapers.  The only one that could have was the collector general, and only after Harbinger abandoned the base. 

[Sky Shadowing]

I'm no science geek, but I'll attempt to present a counterargument.



You have to remember that the Reapers are at least 37,000,000 years old. Their technology is far, far, far more advanced. Who knows what they're capable of?



In terms of humanity becoming goo, one could argue that the nanomachines are breaking humanity into their basest components, sorting out the useful ones and discarding the useless ones. They could use organic material to help forge some strange alloys- isn't carbon a pretty common part of many alloys?- that we haven't discovered yet, or don't know how to make.



As the nanobots gooify the human prisoners, they also analyze and store the data of the brain of the person. Though they can't capture the actual being within, they manage to capture enough of the "essence" to make it useful. They look for links between humans, and craft an artificial intelligence using the basis of all humans. They try and give it the essence of all the humans through something not dissimilar to a geth network, to allow the program to second-guess itself, and achieve total sapience.



As for why it's similar to humans, crafting something out of the data of thousands of human minds has got to have a few things for that mind to find "familiar". They're not trying to build a Reaper using humans as inspiration, they're trying to integrate everything that is best about humanity to themselves, to gain it's strengths.



When Sovereign talks with Shepard in ME1, he views humanity as just another organic species. When Sovereign is destroyed, the Reapers are forced to reevaluate the humans, and deem them "worthy" of "ascension". Why just destroy humanity when you can turn them into one of you?



We also have to realize that the Reapers are not just machines. They're sentient. They have a long standing history. They have rituals, they have emotions. They have traditions, one of which may be the process they're putting humanity through.



The end of ME2 was not a good time to explain everything. "Oh, my teammates are under fire by your forces, I'll just stand here and talk to you about things. I'm sure they'll wait, too."



I expect a long, drawn out conversation with a Reaper, similar to the Sovereign conversation. I expect everything about them to be explained then.



Don't forget, Bioware has had everything planned out since Day 1 on Mass Effect. I'm sure they didn't just shoehorn this in for the hell of it. And since everything else is well explained, this will be too.

[TheLostGenius]

The part that makes me cry is when Harbinger tells me that he is going to hurt me. I cry with fear each time. He is so scary.