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[Sable Rhapsody]

Squeeze the Fish wrote...

Mariquis wrote...

 The military tactics (execution squads and `safe camps`) made me sad face. I like that Bioware doesn`t make their characters/races out to be so extremely good or extremely evil, that there are lots of gray areas.

That stuff was particularly interesting to me, as was reading the parts about turian suicide.

But something to note, the "safe camps" really sounded like they were exactly what they were supposed to be. As I read it, turians attempt to get anyone who will surrender to these camps where they provide shelter, food, safety etc. and then kill anyone who won't join/resists. Part of the "total war" mentality. I didn't get the impression that the "safe camps" were really concentration camps in disguise.

I really liked the CDN list--some elements of the turians seem to draw inspiration from the Roman Empire, or even the samurai culture of feudal Japan (duels, suicide, etc.)  

And I agree, I like that no race is particularly "good" or "evil" by our standards.  That's how sci-fi races should be done (looking at you here, James Cameron ).  There are plenty of objectionable things about the Council races, and plenty of admirable things about everyone's favorite villains in the krogan, rachni, and geth.

[Alienmorph]

Sable Rhapsody wrote...
And I agree, I like that no race is particularly "good" or "evil" by our standards.  That's how sci-fi races should be done (looking at you here, James Cameron ).  There are plenty of objectionable things about the Council races, and plenty of admirable things about everyone's favorite villains in the krogan, rachni, and geth.

Sable you're officially my favourite MiriFan. And I agree me too... turians are warriors, not necessary good or evil. It's not a thing about where you born, but about how you live. There are Garrus, Valarn, Kuril and Saren... they're a lot different because they're different people before members of the same species. And turians in particular are one of the most diffuse species of the ME's galaxy it would be ridiculous if they behaved all in the same way. Let's just hope that BW will remember that and won't turn Garrus into a new Saren in the classic "shocking twist"

[Mariquis]

Eeee. Avatar was exactly what I was thinking about when I said that. The movie was beautiful but there were no redeeming features whatsoever for the 'human' side.



Yeah I noticed that Japanese cultural influence as well, and thought it was pretty interesting. I would be so sad it Garrus became the next Saren.. but I'd have trouble seeing how that would work if you walked a paragon path. Renegade Shep, yeah definitely. But Paragon shep >_> I dunno.



That said it would certainly pack one hell of an emotional punch. Could you imagine if one of the moral dilemmas was something that was 'save this earth colony' or 'save this turian colony' though. Yikes. Especially if Garrus was there to weigh in. A decision like that might be enough to make him go rogue.

[Kim Shepard]

Batarians seem pretty evil as a species to me, but there are some individuals who aren't. It's nice that a bunch of my Shepards can all agree on batarian hate though. xD

Alienmorph wrote...

And while everyone on Thessia was spilling crocodile tears, quarians were almost the only ones who did something concrete to help. Yes, they're really a race of thieves and useless people [/sarcasm]

An example of "Team Dextro" helping each other out? I like it.

And I don't think Garrus will turn into Saren. I mean, my FemShep wouldn't mind... but it's not in his character.

[Sable Rhapsody]

Alienmorph wrote...

Sable you're officially my favourite MiriFan. 

D'awww.  Thanks   

Mariquis wrote...

Eeee. Avatar was exactly what I was thinking about when I said that. The movie was beautiful but there were no redeeming features whatsoever for the 'human' side.

What pisses me off about Avatar is that it had so much potential.  My old science writing professor knew folks on the panel of scientists and science journalists who advised Cameron's creative staff.  If you eliminate the Na'vi from the picture, the planet of Pandora is one of the most spectacular pieces of worldbuilding I've ever seen, and not in the "it's pretty" sense.  They took enormous pains with the biology, evolution, hexapodal creatures...making it all fit together in a way that was plausible scientifically and beautiful visually.  

And then they drop 10 foot blue sexy catpeople into the middle of it all, and I facepalmed.  Hard 

Mariquis wrote...
 I would be so sad it Garrus became the next Saren.. but I'd have trouble seeing how that would work if you walked a paragon path. Renegade Shep, yeah definitely. But Paragon shep >_> I dunno.

I don't think Garrus would ever do this, even if Renegaded.  Remember Pat Weekes describing Garrus as a compassionate Renegade?  There are a lot of ways to describe Saren.  "Compassionate" is not one of them.  Even if played full Renegade, Garrus's ruthless tendencies are born not out of cynicism or bitterness, like with Saren, but out of a sense of compassion for those wronged, and a desire to protect them.

[Alienmorph]

Mariquis wrote...
Eeee. Avatar was exactly what I was thinking about when I said that. The movie was beautiful but there were no redeeming features whatsoever for the 'human' side.

That was the Cameron's idea. The humans are the bad guys, the initial cutted scenes on earth seems to point that humans in Avatar are almost fu***d and earth is a polluted wastland fullfilled of overpopuled cities. BtW it's "funny" thinking that the entire world loves a movie about an transpecies relationship, where the message is "become one of them to be an hero", and the ME alien romancers have to be treated like idiots

And me too I don't think that Garrus will be the next Saren, but look at what BW did in the first 2 minutes of ME2. I dunno what we can expect, so I use to consider the full range of possibilities.

[Mariquis]

I think Batarians just aren't represented well, really. In the sense that we have barely MET any that aren't criminals. In the novels we see that they have a society like any other just with an emphasis on class placement. Saren actually acts a lot more savage than any Batarian in that book. And Sergent Cathka (sp?) just seemed like your typical mercenary, not any more or less pleasant than any other merc. If you bring Zaeed to talk to Tarak he actually has a brief and non-hostile chat where Tarak wishes him the best. The driver taking you there as well is non-hostile and actually warns you and tells you to be careful. We also know that there was a Batarian on Garrus' squad.



That said, hopefully we get out of the Terminus next time and have a chance to meet some more normal batarians!

[Kim Shepard]

Sable Rhapsody wrote...

I don't think Garrus would ever do this, even if Renegaded.  Remember Pat Weekes describing Garrus as a compassionate Renegade?  There are a lot of ways to describe Saren.  "Compassionate" is not one of them.  Even if played full Renegade, Garrus's ruthless tendencies are born not out of cynicism or bitterness, like with Saren, but out of a sense of compassion for those wronged, and a desire to protect them.

Yeah, Saren wanted to save organics from being killed off by the Reapers, and he has standards that keep him from being "evil", but I get the idea his first thought about Omega would be "not my problem." xD

[Alienmorph]

Yep, Batarians seems to be the the unique black or white race until now. The unique decent batarian we know is the one who was in Garrus's team. But of him we know he was just a good tech expert, so meybe even him was just a merc. Oh, and the Vorchas too, but they're like sentient rats so it's not surprising that they're not "friendly".

Modifié par Alienmorph, 20 janvier 2011 - 09:32 .

[Mariquis]

Also I spent so long just wasting time that now my comment seems completely out of place, haha. That was @ Kim Shepard



And yeah I don't even know what happened with the big blue cat people. why only two arms and two legs? they don't seem to have much in common with any other creature, excepting their hair nervous system.



It really chokes me that they didn't include that bit about earth being more or less screwed, because that exactly what I was looking for when I went into that movie. Something very.. princess mononoke-ish where it makes you think about what really is good and evil.



But yeah it's probably obviously that I haven't encouraged Garrus to be renegade, I have no idea what he's like if you do. I didn't realize they'd described him as a compassionate renegade and you're totally right I don't think he'd ever go the same way as Saren in that case. For some reason I never really considered the motivation behind his renegade attitude. At the same time, Bioware could pull almost anything. So long as it is well written I'll suck it up.



But I really hope Garrus sticks around in his best friend/SO capacity.

[Kim Shepard]

Mariquis wrote...

I think Batarians just aren't represented well, really. In the sense that we have barely MET any that aren't criminals. In the novels we see that they have a society like any other just with an emphasis on class placement. Saren actually acts a lot more savage than any Batarian in that book. And Sergent Cathka (sp?) just seemed like your typical mercenary, not any more or less pleasant than any other merc. If you bring Zaeed to talk to Tarak he actually has a brief and non-hostile chat where Tarak wishes him the best. The driver taking you there as well is non-hostile and actually warns you and tells you to be careful. We also know that there was a Batarian on Garrus' squad.

That said, hopefully we get out of the Terminus next time and have a chance to meet some more normal batarians!

I don't think he did. Saren was disgusted by the batarian who wanted to torture a prostitute (she was human too), and called people who torture innocent victims for their own pleasure "sick bastards." Batarian slavers basically make a living by doing that. Not all batarians are slavers, but it's a big part of their cultutre.

[Mariquis]

I did consider that scene, but I was mostly thinking about the scene with Jella (the only suviving worker) that Saren 'visited' in the hospital. Where he wakes her up from her chemically induced coma to get a name from her and just lets her die after, even though he could have saved her.



Spoilers - passage from Mass Effect: Revelation



"Jella was still thrashing uncontrollably, trapped in the throes of her ravaged body's desperate struggle to survive. But she was growing weaker now, her strength ebbing away. Saren idly twirled the hypodermic that might save her between his fingers, still consider the problem of Edan as he waited for her to expire.

...

Two minutes later, Jella was finally still. The turian checked her body for any signs of life, confirming what hte monitors already told him: she was gone. Only now did he take the syringe and inject it into the IV, knowing it was too late to have any affect. Then he carefully placed thee mpty needle in plain view on the small table near the bed."



And that was after like two pages of describing her horrible condition and the pain she was in ) :

[Tasha vas Nar Rayya]

Alienmorph wrote...

Yep, Batarians seems to be the the unique black or white race until now. The unique decent batarian we know is the one who was in Garrus's team. But of him we know he was just a good tech expert, so meybe even him was just a merc. Oh, and the Vorchas too, but they're like sentient rats so it's not surprising that they're not "friendly".

There is one other decent batarian I noticed called Salkie. He is the guy who welcomes you on Garrus' Recruitment mission. He treats you like any other race, and is actually really quite nice and empathetic. I hope he wasn't one of the mercs who got killed. Worse yet, I hope I didn't kill him when Garrus and I were 'holding the line.'  He was ace.

And I'm gone for a day and there are ten extra pages! The fringeless female turian really hit it off! It does look weird, but as someone pointed out, she is not necessarily representative of all turians females, maybe it will explain further in the comic? It so obviously contradicts what is in the game, so hopefully it is an anomoly?

[Kim Shepard]

@Mariquis: I didn't mind that scene, actually. Saren needed to get his information, and considering how ruthless the turian military can be, I think a lot of them would have done the same thing. Their methods are brutal, but efficient - and they don't torture just for the sake of torture. With her injuries... who knows, Saren could have done her a favor by letting her die.

"Savage" makes me think of krogan with bloodrage - they have urges for violence, pain, and destruction. Saren's the opposite - he's always calm, collected, and has a reason to justify his actions (which is normally "for the good of the mission").

[Sable Rhapsody]

Mariquis wrote...

But yeah it's probably obviously that I haven't encouraged Garrus to be renegade, I have no idea what he's like if you do. I didn't realize they'd described him as a compassionate renegade and you're totally right I don't think he'd ever go the same way as Saren in that case. For some reason I never really considered the motivation behind his renegade attitude. At the same time, Bioware could pull almost anything. So long as it is well written I'll suck it up.

But I really hope Garrus sticks around in his best friend/SO capacity.

I've ended up with confuzzled Garrus.  I think the game's morality system itself has trouble parsing the difference in the MOTIVATION for killing people, so the more you encourage Garrus to kill bad guys, the more Renegade he turns regardless of the motivation for the decision.

My Shep considered Saren too dangerous to let him live.  But she wanted Saleon alive for interrogation and absolutely refused to let Garrus kill Sidonis for personal revenge.  In her opinion, personal motivations are never good reasons for killing someone, regardless of what you want.  That combination of choices ended up with Garrus neutral to renegade in ME1, and Paragon in ME2.  Poor guy's so confused.

[Kim Shepard]

I always Renegade Garrus, but when I play my multiple-personality Shepard, he'll end up with the confused dialogue (still Renegade solutions to his missions though). It'll be hilarious. >

[Sable Rhapsody]

Kim Shepard wrote...

@Mariquis: I didn't mind that scene, actually. Saren needed to get his information, and considering how ruthless the turian military can be, I think a lot of them would have done the same thing. Their methods are brutal, but efficient - and they don't torture just for the sake of torture. With her injuries... who knows, Saren could have done her a favor by letting her die.

I think Mariquis' objection, like mine is that he didn't need to let her die just to get his information.  He could've saved the life of a completely innocent person AND gotten what he wanted, and he actively chose not to.  That's...kinda twisted.  There was nothing to be gained by her death, and he did it anyway.

Also, I have no sympathy for Saren's ultimate fate, and you do, so I guess that colors our opinions.  We'll just agree to disagree as usual 

On the batarians: I liked how they were presented to reinforce the stereotypes unless you take the time to dig a little deeper.  That's how it goes in real life sometimes.  Might even be a case of Fridge Brilliance on the part of the designers--every Shep, even one with minimal backstory with the batarians, is taught from day 1 that they hate humans and are a bunch of criminal, slaving bastards.  It takes work to overcome that mentality, and the game doesn't make it easy for you.

At face value, they're a bunch of thugs and mercenaries who are always in your way and don't seem to understand kindness or aid.  But if you save the life of the dying batarian and spare the ones threatening Daniel, they act a lot differently.  It's kinda nice.

[Tasha vas Nar Rayya]

I always renegade Garrus too. If an individual will (or has) caused more deaths than one, then it better for them to lose their own life.
After all, multiple deaths are worse than one. And Saleon's death is preventing more deaths that his continued experiments will no doubt cause. As for Sidonis, he caused the deaths of Garrus' squad. So his death is lesser than those deaths.
Also, I am a strong believer that people should suffer the consequences for their actions. I know Sidonis is imprisoned and eventually kills himself if warned by Shepard, but I wanted Garrus to make his own decision. I knew it was what he wanted. But if my Shepard could have killed Sidonis herself, she would have.
No one messes with Garrus.
Edit: @ Sable, true. I am not sure if batarians just hate humans (and vorcha,) or if it a universal racism, but at face value, they appear to be 'baddies.' But looking closer at the batarians who defy the stereotype makes you realise how deep the Mass Effect universe is. And I love the line: 'Human nobility. I didn't know such a thing existed.'

Modifié par Tasha vas Nar Rayya, 20 janvier 2011 - 10:22 .

[Mariquis]

Yes, that was exactly my objection! It actually took more effort on his part to wait for her to die before injecting the medication anyways, than it would have to just a) inject the med and leave just leave and let the doctor handle it.



And with the guy Garrus had on his squad, he says 'not the friendliest guy ever...' but at the same time, clearly Garrus trusted the guy with his life, and the lives of the rest of their squad. And ultimately it wasn't the batarian who betrayed Garrus. I seriously wish we got a bit more exposition on Garrus and his squad during the good times (better times?)

[Sable Rhapsody]

Tasha vas Nar Rayya wrote...

I always renegade Garrus too. If an individual will (or has) caused more deaths than one, then it better for them to lose their own life.
After all, multiple deaths are worse than one. And Saleon's death is preventing more deaths that his continued experiments will no doubt cause. As for Sidonis, he caused the deaths of Garrus' squad. So his death is lesser than those deaths.
Also, I am a strong believer that people should suffer the consequences for their actions. I know Sidonis is imprisoned and eventually kills himself if warned by Shepard, but I wanted Garrus to make his own decision. I knew it was what he wanted. But if my Shepard could have killed Sidonis herself, she would have.
No one messes with Garrus.'

See, my Shep didn't look at the Saleon decision that way.  Very few people actually escape prison, sci-fi tropes aside.  Putting him away has the same effect as killing him, plus the possibility, however slim, of getting information out of him.  And he only got away the first time because C-Sec refused to shoot him when he was escaping.  I doubt Shep has such compunctions.

As for Sidonis, I the player agree with you.  Bastard needs to pay.  But my SHEP doesn't see things that way.  She doesn't care about what's right or what's just or what people deserve.  She cares about what's best overall, and only about what's best.  And if that's how you see the world, then Sidonis doesn't need to die for Garrus to resolve his emotional problems.  

[Tasha vas Nar Rayya]

Why do you think that putting Saleon away has the same effect as killing him?

I killed him myself because I didn't want any more deaths/mutations/horrid torture caused by Saleon when Shepard had the option to end it right there. Also, Garrus was less mature at this time and let justice control his actions rather than reason. I wanted to show him that revenge is not always the most suitable way to deal with an unjust individual.

You are right, Sidonis didn't need to die for Garrus to resolve his emotional problems, but he deserved to die as a traitor and a murderer.

[Kim Shepard]

Sable Rhapsody wrote...

I think Mariquis' objection, like mine is that he didn't need to let her die just to get his information.  He could've saved the life of a completely innocent person AND gotten what he wanted, and he actively chose not to.  That's...kinda twisted.  There was nothing to be gained by her death, and he did it anyway.

Also, I have no sympathy for Saren's ultimate fate, and you do, so I guess that colors our opinions.  We'll just agree to disagree as usual 

I think Saren's the kind of guy who wouldn't consider that much of a life though. If he was in the same position (and it wasn't possible for him to become a half-cyborg in order to see, hear, talk, walk, and hold a gun), I seriously believe he would have wanted to die. From his point of view, it's possible that her life would have no meaning after the accident. That's my theory, anyway. All we can do is come up with theories. Even if I don't agree with everything Saren does or thinks, I can still like that part of his personality. I mean, it would be easier for my poor MainShep to romance him if he didn't hate humans... but I like that part of his personality, and MainShep has the exact same hate for the species that killed her family.

And I agree with what you said about the batarians.

[Kim Shepard]

Tasha vas Nar Rayya wrote...

Also, I am a strong believer that people should suffer the consequences for their actions. I know Sidonis is imprisoned and eventually kills himself if warned by Shepard, but I wanted Garrus to make his own decision. I knew it was what he wanted. But if my Shepard could have killed Sidonis herself, she would have.
No one messes with Garrus.

I thought Sidonis couldn't be arrested for his crimes because they happened in the Terminus systems, and is still alive as far as we know? That's what I've read. Never tried it myself, obviously.

[Sable Rhapsody]

Tasha vas Nar Rayya wrote...

Why do you think that putting Saleon away has the same effect as killing him?
I killed him myself because I didn't want any more deaths/mutations/horrid torture caused by Saleon when Shepard had the option to end it right there. Also, Garrus was less mature at this time and let justice control his actions rather than reason. I wanted to show him that revenge is not always the most suitable way to deal with an unjust individual.
You are right, Sidonis didn't need to die for Garrus to resolve his emotional problems, but he deserved to die as a traitor and a murderer.

Because I doubt Saleon could continue performing such horrid experiments behind bars, deprived from his lab and under lock and key.  He wasn't a Lector, smart enough to continue hurting people while jailed.  If he had been, he would've made a much more formidable opponent to Shep.  He was just a sick bastard who capitalized on a situation.  It would've been the same effect.  With the ship and Garrus's previous testimony, they had incontrovertible evidence to convict him.  And since Saleon was floating out by his lonesome in space, I doubt he could've accessed a fantastic lawyer to get him off.

As for Sidonis, I 100% agree.  He does deserve to die a horrible death.  Eleven of them, in fact--one for each person he killed, and one for Garrus whom he betrayed.  But...that's not how my FemShep operates.  It was one of those moments where I couldn't do something because of the character herself--those moments are always awesome but frustrating.

[Kim Shepard]

Sable Rhapsody wrote...

As for Sidonis, I 100% agree.  He does deserve to die a horrible death.  Eleven of them, in fact--one for each person he killed, and one for Garrus whom he betrayed. 

That sounds just like my Earthborn Ruthless Shepard. xD He was surprised that Garrus only wanted to shoot him dead, but he didn't object because it was Garrus' revenge kill and not his. It made him happier to know that Sidonis was having nightmares though.