363 réponses à ce sujet

[FlyinElk212]

Zulu,

I love your new I support Rage sig. I giggled like a little girly girl. That is all.

[Zulu_DFA]

FlyinElk212 wrote...

Zulu,

I love your new I support Rage sig. I giggled like a little girly girl. That is all.

In a sudden strike of creativity I made a whole bunch of them.

http://social.biowar...9412/36#6356914

However, given the recent developments, guess I should add one saying "he is an admiral now... "

[Babli]

Zulu_DFA wrote...

aimlessgun wrote...

Interesting thread. Either there's something to what Zulu is saying, or they screwed up the entire ME story. Frankly, it's far, far more likely that they just screwed up.

I think it's both actually.

In the begining the story was well thought out and planned for the entire lenght of the trilogy. That possibly included all the ME2 twists, such as Shepard's alleged death and comeback, Cerberus turning good guys, the Collectors, Liara becoming the Shadow Broker, etc.

But after ME1 was done, BioWare started implementing this "fluent shooter" crap (Don't get me wrong, I love shooters. Only I love good shooters, and that means first person, for starters.) To that end they started cutting the amount of dialogue lines that would clarify the intricacies of the plot, as they thought people were skipping most of the dialogue anyway. In fact, in ME2 there is a loading screen tip encouraging people to skip lines - even those that got left behind. They also attempted to make ME2 more hollywoody, and more comicbookish, by turning the cutscene power to the max, which meant turning the cutscene sense to the min. Finally, they just started rushing the deadlines, cut off the Shadow Broker plotline to sell it later as DLC, so yeah...

They just screwed up.

Well said. I like to put it like this -
Mass Effect 1 = SW IV - which is also my favourite SW movie. Great introduction into new universe. Everything just perfectly works.
Mass Effect 2 = SW II - I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.

Modifié par Babli, 30 mars 2011 - 10:44 .

[Zulu_DFA]

One interesting fact more, suggesting that both the Beacons and the Citadel are not what Vigil said they were:

   

The similarity is striking.

So why would the Protheans design their "Extranet servers" after the Citadel Tower?

Because they aren't Prothean Beacons. They are Reaper Beacons!

(Which is also evidenced by the fact that Shepard's vision is similar to TIM's vision).

Modifié par Zulu_DFA, 21 avril 2011 - 01:05 .

[MACharlie1]

Zulu_DFA wrote...

One more interesting fact, sugeesting that bot the Beacons and the Citadel are not what Vigil said they were"

   

The similarity is striking.

So why would the Protheans design their "Extranet servers" after the Citadel Tower?

Because they aren't Prothean Beacons. They are Reaper Beacons!

(Which is also evidenced by the fact that Shepard's vision is similar to TIM's vision).

Interesting. Then by your theory that pyramid beacon in ME2 was also a Reaper construction - which also replaces the husk Prothean with a Collector? 

[Zulu_DFA]

MACharlie1 wrote...

Interesting. Then by your theory that pyramid beacon in ME2 was also a Reaper construction - which also replaces the husk Prothean with a Collector? 

Naturally.

[Zulu_DFA]

To expand my earlier post and illustrate the possibility that Omega might be a Reaper factory built at the "dawn of time", pictures:












Note: the image of the Collector Base may be anywhere between 100% and 200% to the Omega's scale (so that the C-Base may be a smaller version of a Reaper factory that the one that is/was embedded within the Omega's structure).


To that I can add that perhaps Omega was first used as a sort of shipyard to build the Citadel itself. Perhaps the Citadel was assembled around the Omega, kind of like a shell around a kernel, and was disentangled from it upon completion.

Modifié par Zulu_DFA, 13 août 2011 - 06:13 .

[Sajuro]

Zulu_DFA wrote...

MACharlie1 wrote...

Interesting. Then by your theory that pyramid beacon in ME2 was also a Reaper construction - which also replaces the husk Prothean with a Collector? 

Naturally.

Couldn't it have been that the Protheans found that shape to be an effecient form for a terminal which would relate to their greater studies of the Citadel and Relays than current races.

[Zulu_DFA]

Sajuro wrote...

Zulu_DFA wrote...

MACharlie1 wrote...

Interesting. Then by your theory that pyramid beacon in ME2 was also a Reaper construction - which also replaces the husk Prothean with a Collector? 

Naturally.

Couldn't it have been that the Protheans found that shape to be an effecient form for a terminal which would relate to their greater studies of the Citadel and Relays than current races.

In any event, replicating the Reaper technology is what the Reapers want, as it sets the organics on the "path of the crop". That's how the cycle works. At a later stage, the "chosen races" become one with the Reapers (via the mind link - see Husks, Paul Grayson), which is the next thing to being Reapers themselves (via the gooification).

[Uzun]

1. Vigil was not a simple VI. Protheans were aware that the Council Chambers has master control unit of the Citadel. They probably were studying it as well at Ilos, since they think Mass Relays, Citadel etc are the legacy of those who came before them. Vigil must have had all the data on them because they were trying to imitate original Mass Relays, they needed all the knowledge they can get.

Considering Vigil was online for 50.000 years, it could have examined the Citadel control's software for the whole time and develop a virus to hack it temporarily.

2.Just explained above, if the Reapers knew about Ilos they would go to "Reap" the Protheans living there. But same as why they have not "Reaped" the Earth, they did not detect/believe there was an intelligent life form there (perhaps thanks to the hibernation the Protheans went under). Why would you destroy a species long before they can develop and be ready for harvesting if you were a Reaper?

3. They had no idea about Reapers right untill the invasion happened. This one makes no sense.

4. Council itself could have extracted all the data they could. Then deliberately destroy/turn off Vigil to support their "oh the Citadel attack was made by Geth" idea, believing the Reaper threat is over.

5. Saren/Sovereign had no idea about Ilos before interpreting the data from Prothean Beacons. The infiltration plan through Ilos was probably made after discovering what the Protheans have done there.

6. Chorban also mentions they did not respond the way they do this time. The Keepers used to directly take signal from Reapers before, then they evolved to take signal from the Citadel only. When Protheans hacked into system with virus made by Vigil, they could easily change controls of the Citadel to "ignore" the signal Sovereign would eventually send. That same virus/data file basically made it possible for them to hack the Citadel and change what they wanted to.

[TuringPoint]

Just throwing this out there... the lore in game says Omega is a modern construction, built in this cycle by currently existing sentient beings.

[MrPepper]

supakillaii wrote...

We don't know if they start with Earth.<br />
And if the Old Machines would start with the planet of origin, they would have struck Ilos first, which they didn't.

I thought Ilos was a top secret research facility, not the Prothean homeworld.

[capn233]

I realize this thread is nearly as old as the Protheans, but I wanted reply because there are some interesting hypotheses... I wouldn't say theory though, you need more evidence for something to be a theory.  There is a lot of speculation and conjecture filling in the gaps that are not available in the games or the outside media.

I do disagree with some ideas.  The first is that within the context of ME1 that Vigil's story is inconsistent.  Vigil more or less confirms what you have learned over the course of the game with the revelation that Citadel is in fact a mass relay, and exerts control over the mass relay network.  I don't recall even seeing quotes of the source:

"But the Citadel is a trap.  It is an enormous mass relay. One that links to dark space... When the Citadel rely is activated, the Reapers will pour through.  And you will be destroyed."

"The Reapers seized control of the Citadel and through it, the mass relays.  Communication across our empire were crippled.  Each star system was isolated, cutoff from the others.  Easy prey for the Reaper fleets.  Over the next decades, the Reapers systematically obliterated our people.  World by world, system by system, they methodically wiped us out."

"Through the Citadel, the Reapers had access to all our records, maps, census data.  Information is power, and they knew everything about us.... Within a few centuries, the Reapers had killed or enslaved every Prothean in the galaxy.  They were relentless, brutal, and absolutely thorough."

"The Conduit is the key.  Before the Reapers attacked, we Protheans were on the cusp of unlocking the mysteries behind mass relay technology.  Ilos was a top secret research facility.  Here, researchers worked to create a small scale version of a mass relay.  One that linked directly to the Citadel, the hub of the mass relay network."

"We severed all communication with the outside and our facility went dark.  The personnel retreated underground into these archives...."

"But the genocide of an entire species is a long, slow process.  Years passed.  Decades... centuries.  The Reapers persisted.  And my energy reserves were dwindling...."

"Eventually only the stasis pods of the top scientists remained active.  Even these were in danger of failing when the Reapers finally retreated back through the Citadel relay."

"I saved key personnel.  When the Reapers retreated, the top researchers were still alive.  My actions are the only reason any hope remains.  When the researchers woke, they realized the Prothean species was doomed.  There were only a dozen individuals left; far too few to sustain a viable population.  Yet they vowed to find some way to stop the Reapers from returning. A way to break the cycle forever.  And they knew the keepers were the key."

Why is Saren trying to find the Conduit?

"The Conduit gives him access to the Citadel and the keepers.  The keepers are controlled by the Citadel.  Before each invasion, a signal is sent through the station compelling the keepers to activate the Citadel relay.  After decades of feverish study, the scientists discovered a way to alter this signal.  Using the Conduit, they gained access to the Citadel and made the modifications.  This time, when Sovereign sent the signal to the Citadel, the keepers ignored it.  The Reapers are trapped in dark space."

Saren can use the Conduit to bypass all the Citadels external defenses.

"Correct.  And once inside, he can transfer control of the station to Sovereign.  Sovereign will override the Citadel's systems and manually open the relay..."

"There's a data file in my console.  Take a copy when you go.  When you reach the Citadel's master control unit, upload it to the station.  It will corrupt the Citadel's security protocols and give you temporary control over the station.  It might give you a chance against Sovereign."

Why doesn't Sovereign attack the Citadel directly

"Sovereign is not invincible.  Revealing its true nature would have united the forces of every organic species against it.  Even a Reaper couldn't survivie such odds.  But the Reapers are patient.  They do not rush into the unknown.  Sovereign could have been planning this for centuries.  Moving deliberately, gathering allies.  Slowly it has assembled the pieces of the puzzle, working through agents to keep itself hidden.  Saren is the most visible pawn of the Reapers, but I doubt he was the first."

Why didn't you fight?

"We were a few hundred against a galactic invasion fleet.  Our only hope was to stay hidden."

What about the beacon on Eden Prime and Virmire?

"We used them as a single galaxy-wide network, to transmit data and communications rapidly from world to world.  Virtually all the beacons were destroyed during the invasion.  But once the Reapers were gone, the survivors on Ilos decided to risk sending out a message.  We knew it was unlikely that there were other survivors.  But if there were, we wanted them to know about Ilos.  We wanted to give them hope.  So a message was sent across the network."

You could have exposed yourself to the Reapers

"In truth, we didn't expect any of the beacons would still function.  but we had to try. If there were survivors, we had to reach them.  The message was meant for our own people.  It was coded so only organic beings could interpret it.  We still didn't understand the power of Reaper indoctrination.  We never realized it could lead an agent of the machines--like Saren-- to this world.  But it has also led you here.  So perhaps we did not fail after all."

What happened to the survivors of the research project

"They used the conduit to gain access to the Citadel.  But the conduit is only a prototype.  The portal only links in one direction.  So they were trapped on the station.  I do not know what they became of them then.  It is unlikely they found any food or water on the station.  I fear they suffered a slow grim death.  I only know that they succeeded in their mission to seal the relay.  Your presence here proves their sacrifice was not in vain."


In the context of ME1 there really isn't any reason not to believe Vigil, and I do not think ME2 or the novels give you any good reason to either.  The Reapers used the Citadel to rapidly move into the galaxy, kill the leadership, obtain the relevant data on the species, and seize control of the network.  If you think about the Reaper plan, it is about maximizing potential for success while minimizing risk.  They are able to glean all the intel they need from the databanks of the Citadel, remove the leadership, and also control the relays.  Without the relays reinforcements are trapped in their systems or clusters.  They are isolated such that the reapers can choose where to attack, when to attack, and overwhelm them.

Why have a gigantic relay when they can fly from dark space?  It is likely because it takes less time and less energy.  Mass relay is instant, other FTL is not.  Presumably they also don't want to waste a bunch of energy traveling.  If you could construct a gateway that let you drive from New York to LA instantly, using next to no gas, would you not bother to use it and instead drive there over several days at a much higher cost in fuel?

Why does Saren need the Conduit?  The Citadel has a standing fleet.  It may or may not be a threat to Sovereign in a straight up battle, but simply destroying the fleet is not Sovi's goal; his goal is to activate the relay.  More importantly, the Citadel's main defense is closing the arms.  Saren cannot activate the Citadel relay by himself, Sovereign must interface with the Citadel.  If Sovi just jumps into system, there is no guarantee he can bum rush the station through the fleet and make it inside before CSec or whoever closes the arms.  Then the mission is failed.  And I doubt even Saren wields enough influence to convince the council "Hey, let this dreadnought of unprecedented power and unknown configuration dock with the tower in the Presidium."

But what is the deal with Ilos?  The main inconsistency in the game comes from the planet description versus Vigil's statement about the facility going dark.  My explanation is a more simple one in that when he states "Ilos was a top secret research facility" there was simply a dialogue writing error, and he should have said the Ilos Research Facility was top secret.  He later states they had a few hundred people.  That is strictly the personnel of the facility, not the planet of Ilos.  The main facility was underground, as were the cryogenically suspended researchers.  If we believe the planet description, the Reapers probably did find Ilos, killed the random civilians that were there, but did not find the research facility.  They had no knowledge that it existed, and the random civies would not have known about it, even if indoctrinated.  If you don't think it was bunker-ish enough, that was a level design problem, not necessarily a plot problem.

What happened to the researchers?  Nobody knows.  Vigil speculates.  We know that they did not even go to the Citadel until decades after the Reapers had left.  If they were past breeding age, or chose not to, they would have died of old age even with food.  I think the lack of their bodies is immaterial.  The keepers could even hibernate with all the Citadel functions offline after a cycle until somebody uses a nearby Reaper network relay.  There is simply no data presented yet to make anything more than a speculation.

Why does Sovi need to find Ilos if the Reapers know Ilos exists?  He doesn't need to find Ilos for the sake of finding the planet.  Through Saren, he learned that Ilos had a secret research facility with the Conduit.  It is likely that Saren had a vision from the Virmire beacon first, then attacked Eden Prime when that beacon was discovered.  Perhaps Sovereign could more rapidly interpret the visions than Liara such that they were suspicious of a mass relay project after the first beacon... which is why he wanted to go to Eden Prime to fill in more of the message.  Who knows.  Clearly the beacon visions from Sovereign's agent allowed him to formulate a workable plan to activate the Citadel.

Why didn't he study the keepers?  We don't know that he didn't.  In any case, what Vigil says about the modification the Protheans did was not entirely clear.  Did they modify the Citadel signal routines, the keepers themselves, or both?  If we believe both him and Chorban, perhaps both.

Was Sovereign left behind?  It is unclear if he actually was or not.  Vigil makes an assumption that Sovereign was left to hang out throughout the cycle.  Perhaps he was not.  We do not know when the Reapers first tried to activate the Citadel.  It likely wasn't before 580BC when the Asari found the Citadel.  We don't know how far they hide in dark space, nor do we know their non relay FTL speed so he could have even been in dark space until the signal failed, then made the long trip in to investigate.  I don't think it matters all that much one way or the other.  But taking a more mild view of Sovi vs Harbi, perhaps it was Sovi's job to stay behind and monitor the Protheans, which he did a poor job of... then Harbi came up with the idea to use the Collectors to monitor organics as well.  Sort of a jockeying for positions of power.  Granted that is highly speculative.  Do Reapers even care about their power in that way?

Why did the Collectors try to make their own Reaper to redo Sovi's failed plan?  That is in fact speculation that is most likely incorrect.  We may have assumed that the Reaper was supposed to redo Sovereign's plan, but it is quite possible it was simply a big experiment to see if Humans were compatible.

Why do that any of that?  Perhaps the Protheans were the first species that would have otherwise been worthy of ascension but were unsuitable.  EDI speculated why they were transformed into Collectors, but that is a hypothesis.  It may have been that the Reapers continually refine their plan and incorporated the Collectors as a means to further gain intelligence and influence the evolution through the galaxy for this cycle.

Why are the Reapers so dumb then?  We still do not understand their motives so it would be unfair to call them dumb.  But if they have made a mistake, it may have very well been that they allowed the Protheans too much time to develop without enough supervision.  In fact, this may very well be something they realized and why they turned them into the Collectors.  However, they probably did not realize just how large a mistake they had made until the Citadel failed to respond this time around.

Why make the above claim?  The Protheans had nearly unlocked the mass relay technology such that they could manufacture their own.  These would be independent from the Reaper controlled network.  Dependence on that relay network is one of the Reaper's main means of dominance over the species in the cycles.  In addition, there is a little evidence to suggest that the Protheans may have been manipulating the evolution of the primitive species.  There motives and goals for this may be unclear, but the result could be the number of biotic and space-faring civilizations in the time of ME.  This would not have been in a response to the Reapers obviously, since there would likely not have been Protheans left to do that after they learned of the Reapers.

If anything, I think the biggest inconsistency is how fast the Reapers can get here without the relay.  That is more of a problem with Arrival and perhaps ME3 than Vigil lying.  Consider the closing cinematic of ME2.  Let's pretend Harbi is 2km long.  The galaxy is 9x10^17km across and you can fit most of the diameter in the shot.  They are a hell of a long way out if that cinematic is an indication.  Maybe I will have to chalk that up as a concession to make the shot look pretty.

Modifié par capn233, 01 septembre 2011 - 10:48 .

[Reaper14]

capn has most of the things cleared out , i want to say my opinion is that, everyone poured their theories in this thread, its a thread of theroies rather than facts, and its leght and the amount of interest people has put into could lead confuse some to think they are right, or logical,
dont lead simple logic here and think different:
mass effect 1 is an old classic and a beuty however bioware wasnt a megacorp back than as if it is today so it is posible they didnt see some problems between description and vigil.
everyone says vigil lies or not and put reasons behind their claim , think different ask why the hell would vigil need to lie? protheans are long gone, basterd has nothing to gain or lose, plus its an ai and it wants to give hope to humans so it gave the info correcly righth?
more over the husks, it is very clear that bioware did not know how the protheans should look like and they made their statues on ilos like that, protheans could be huks of their era however, they did the same to humans ( not only to humans, to some guys who are wrong here) about omega and the beacons , the confidence given by popularity of this thread to the creator clearly has mislead him and these are far more " made up" then the fairly logical theories he put in earlier. people see what they want to(or under the influence of images recently seen or made up by mind) see, not what is clearly there, confusing the collector base with omega during loading screen blue prints is nothing more then kids making shapes out of clouds, after a certain point of imagination your brain simplly combines the image in your mind and the image recived, seeing scary stuff in the middle of the night like moving shadows after watching 10 best horror movies as happened to me is the same,to me beacons and the citadel image is just really forcing the hand if you see it and the beacon very similar
more over,
it is posislbe they the 12 sent over the data collected back to vigil, it is not impossible, a long time passed between the 12 and vigil reciving and giving the intel to shep, and if you remember joker contacted us BEYOND THE MASS RELAY when shep was on the citadel figthin saren, it is possible comminication is possible behind relays without delay(maybe the waves are also caried out by the relay) or we do have flt comms that people underestimate, how did the reapers get to earth, its very sloppy but we know it is not flt drive/citadel relay/alpha relay, arrival dlc clearly indicates it will be a lot of time if they try to warp drive out of the alpha relay system, and clearly FTL drive is slow compared to galaxy, FTL drive from dark space to milky wave is just nuts, it is very likely that they used relays that arent mapped, codex clearly says a lot of relays are remain inactive since no one wants to take the risk to see whats behind it, such couriosity can be fatal( hint: thats how rachni wars started, curiosty killed the cat) also clear that vigil is likely to spent its last energy cells while giving information to shepard , it remaind in sleep mode while keeping minimum systems online like sensors to see shepard came and he wasnt indoctrinated, ilos was top screet(reapers had access to prothean arcives and database when they captured citadel, either ilos was kept scret from there too, or bioware also made thispart sloppy as well) and reapers arent omipotent, soverign is dead, reaper armada meets bad end at the end of me 3, reapers arent gods they dont know everything its likely that dint see that coming, - but the small relay in citadel isnt a secret- what if its a one way road? the relay on ilos was built by protheans ,so it wasnt really a part of reaper network sovergn was intentionaly left behind to prep reapers arrival for cycle,just listen to conversations next time you play mass effect instead of bashing space bar. a lot of the theroies here ,there are less theories than you might think, i personely dont count luck pushed hard conspricy theories and personel ideas that stand soley on persons though rather than hard evidence inside the game,
the console and vigil in ilos clearly stated protheans didnt velcome the reapers, if you listen the securty console you see that poor prothean is terrifed not, enjoyed, some parts of the visions clearly resemble several protheans running in panic in a burning city, leviathen isnt soverign also, the dlcs made that part clear, ilos prothean planet of origin? hardly possible as for last part being the 6th, as for the rest of it here hard pushed conspriceies, there is no point in stating if you go with "what if there is more to it" clearly you state you dont know trough me 1 it is clear that keepers used to resbond reaper signals to activate citadel relay, but organics are betraying basterds, keepers evolved to resbond only to citadels signal, ( it must be after events that are told by vigil because ,soverign did send a signal and keepers ignored it, reason stated by vigil was 12 scientists were sucsessfull, so they blocked the sovergins signal and now keepers listen to citadel. also i dont know why reapers dont rush to citadel and take out leadership but instead waste time and ships on front lines of outer rims of citadel space , they didnt attack aliance colonies from out to in, they rushed directly earth( can be wrong, comminication beyond sol relay was cut before the attack(alliance admiral states)) we have no clear evidence on reapers main motives beside from just killig everything and harvesting, as for last , everything here can be chomped together into 3 statements: lack of information on reapers main motives and its reasons leading to highly suspectible conspricies and theories, reaperes arent omipotent they can be killed and they are machines they made calculate the situaton but make a mistake of giving organics too much unsupervised time (supervision is one of the reasons sovergn was left behind),protheans almost made it ,they were able to make their own relay and the second thing being much simpler bioware did leave giant loopholes in details of the story unintentionaly or possibly intentionaly,