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[Dave of Canada]

Oblarg wrote...

You see, if this is true, the Reapers are a pretty pathetic villain.

Well, they already sort of are. They left their biggest cache of information pretty much unguarded because they expected nobody would reach it. For machines with cold logic, that's a little... odd.

[Oblarg]

Dave of Canada wrote...

Oblarg wrote...

You see, if this is true, the Reapers are a pretty pathetic villain.

Well, they already sort of are. They left their biggest cache of information pretty much unguarded because they expected nobody would reach it. For machines with cold logic, that's a little... odd.

True enough.  This is why ME2s plot is so flimsy - it goes against everything we learned about the reapers in the first game.  They went from this huge, powerful, hyper-intelligent machine race that detested organics to a collection of incompetent organic-shaped robots which couldn't even leave themselves a working backdoor into the galaxy in case their usual method didn't work.

[chris025657]

Dave of Canada wrote...

Oblarg wrote...

You see, if this is true, the Reapers are a pretty pathetic villain.

Well, they already sort of are. They left their biggest cache of information pretty much unguarded because they expected nobody would reach it. For machines with cold logic, that's a little... odd.

The Collector base was anything but unguarded. The primary defense was its location in the galactic core that had kept it protected against countless intrusions for presumably tens of thousands of years and perhaps longer. Then there was those drones in addition to at least one collector ship that was capable of detecting and quickly destroying the previously most advanced stealth ship in the galaxy. Not to mention an army of Collectors and a massive chamber filled with seeker swarms. 

[Oblarg]

chris025657 wrote...

Dave of Canada wrote...

Oblarg wrote...

You see, if this is true, the Reapers are a pretty pathetic villain.

Well, they already sort of are. They left their biggest cache of information pretty much unguarded because they expected nobody would reach it. For machines with cold logic, that's a little... odd.

The Collector base was anything but unguarded. The primary defense was its location in the galactic core that had kept it protected against countless intrusions for presumably tens of thousands of years and perhaps longer. Then there was those drones in addition to at least one collector ship that was capable of detecting and quickly destroying the previously most advanced stealth ship in the galaxy. Not to mention an army of Collectors and a massive chamber filled with seeker swarms. 

A chamber full of seeker swarms and an army of collectors would be completely useless if a fleet had just blown the whole damn thing up.  Which would have been fairly easy, seeing as they had nothing more than a handful of drones and one cruiser to guard it.

[Dave of Canada]

Oblarg wrote...

A chamber full of seeker swarms and an army of collectors would be completely useless if a fleet had just blown the whole damn thing up.  Which would have been fairly easy, seeing as they had nothing more than a handful of drones and one cruiser to guard it.

Pretty much this.

Modifié par Dave of Canada, 31 octobre 2010 - 01:06 .

[Arijharn]

Oblarg wrote...

chris025657 wrote...

Dave of Canada wrote...

Oblarg wrote...

You see, if this is true, the Reapers are a pretty pathetic villain.

Well, they already sort of are. They left their biggest cache of information pretty much unguarded because they expected nobody would reach it. For machines with cold logic, that's a little... odd.

The Collector base was anything but unguarded. The primary defense was its location in the galactic core that had kept it protected against countless intrusions for presumably tens of thousands of years and perhaps longer. Then there was those drones in addition to at least one collector ship that was capable of detecting and quickly destroying the previously most advanced stealth ship in the galaxy. Not to mention an army of Collectors and a massive chamber filled with seeker swarms. 

A chamber full of seeker swarms and an army of collectors would be completely useless if a fleet had just blown the whole damn thing up.  Which would have been fairly easy, seeing as they had nothing more than a handful of drones and one cruiser to guard it.

But you're conveniently forgetting that access to the base in the first place was nigh impossible unless someone managed to not only discover a Derelict Reaper, but also pretty much discover it's IFF, which would be a herculean task in and of itself.

Remember, drift with using a Mass Relay is usual, and of this 1500k is standard, but it is wholly inadequate for the purposes of the O4 gateway. Hell, the Normandy had the advantage of using the IFF but still nearly collided with wreckage.

For all we know, the positioning of the Mass Relay means that the usual drift would just place any appearing war ships smack bang into the event horizon of presumably Sagittarius A*, the black hole. Not to mention that the fire-power of the Occuli would make short work (it's fire power obliterate's standard ship armor and appears to bypass shielding) of any surviving ships that don't appear in either the black hole, aren't getting cut apart from the Collector Cruiser's weaponry or running into the ass of some derelict ship that's currently drifting around.

[Dave of Canada]

Arijharn wrote...

But you're conveniently forgetting that access to the base in the first place was nigh impossible unless someone managed to not only discover a Derelict Reaper, but also pretty much discover it's IFF, which would be a herculean task in and of itself.

The IFF was massproduced after it was collected, Cerberus has multiple ships immediately sent to the Base. Should say... the Alliance actually believed and sided with Shepard, they could've easily gotten it from the Collector Ship or the Reaper, massproduce it and send in a fleet against the Collector Base. Aside from that one Collector Ship and two-three drones, there's no exterior defenses.

This leaves the Collector Base really exposed should anybody invade it, assuming they have more defenses on the inside is silly because the only defenses they had in the base itself were the Collectors and their pets, nothing of Reaper construct. The exterior was poorly defended, the interior is poorly defended and that most likely means the Reapers don't have any "hidden traps". Even if they did, I doubt Harbinger would've twirled his (reaper) mustache and refuse to activate it while their entire plan is falling apart.

The core itself was it's greatest defense, without said defense they pretty much had nothing.

[Oblarg]

Dave of Canada wrote...

Arijharn wrote...

But you're conveniently forgetting that access to the base in the first place was nigh impossible unless someone managed to not only discover a Derelict Reaper, but also pretty much discover it's IFF, which would be a herculean task in and of itself.

The IFF was massproduced after it was collected, Cerberus has multiple ships immediately sent to the Base. Should say... the Alliance actually believed and sided with Shepard, they could've easily gotten it from the Collector Ship or the Reaper, massproduce it and send in a fleet against the Collector Base. Aside from that one Collector Ship and two-three drones, there's no exterior defenses.

This leaves the Collector Base really exposed should anybody invade it, assuming they have more defenses on the inside is silly because the only defenses they had in the base itself were the Collectors and their pets, nothing of Reaper construct. The exterior was poorly defended, the interior is poorly defended and that most likely means the Reapers don't have any "hidden traps". Even if they did, I doubt Harbinger would've twirled his (reaper) mustache and refuse to activate it while their entire plan is falling apart.

The core itself was it's greatest defense, without said defense they pretty much had nothing.

Pretty much this.

I still destroyed the base, though, because despite the fact that BioWare seems to be doing everything to convince us otherwise, I'd still like the Reapers to not be completely incompetent.

Modifié par Oblarg, 31 octobre 2010 - 01:33 .

[TcheQ]

Oblarg wrote...

You see, if this is true, the Reapers are a pretty pathetic villain.

Then again, pretty much everything in ME2 points to the reapers being rather moronic, so you could be on to something here.

The base had a mass effect field that was stopping it falling into a black hole.  They needed an IFF from a reaper to not be torn apart by the automated defenses (remember?).  There was so much space junk in the way it's a miracle the normandy got as far as it did.  On top of this, their guardian vessel could down any Alliance cruiser, battleship or dreadnought in one fell swoop.  It was not the reapers who built the Collector base, it was the Collectors. 

As far as I understand it, reapers "do it for the lulz". 

The reapers also never anticipated the Protheans would build a secret base and outsmart them by disabling the trigger inside the Citadel - remember that Humanity and the galaxy owes it's life to the work of the Protheans - without their sacrifice, we would have already been processed.

Modifié par TcheQ, 31 octobre 2010 - 02:41 .

[Oblarg]

TcheQ wrote...

Oblarg wrote...

You see, if this is true, the Reapers are a pretty pathetic villain.

Then again, pretty much everything in ME2 points to the reapers being rather moronic, so you could be on to something here.

The base had a mass effect field that was stopping it falling into a black hole.  They needed an IFF from a reaper to not be torn apart by the automated defenses (remember?).  There was so much space junk in the way it's a miracle the normandy got as far as it did.  On top of this, their guardian vessel could down any Alliance cruiser, battleship or dreadnought in one fell swoop.  It was not the reapers who built the Collector base, it was the Collectors. 

As far as I understand it, reapers "do it for the lulz". 

The reapers also never anticipated the Protheans would build a secret base and outsmart them by disabling the trigger inside the Citadel - remember that Humanity and the galaxy owes it's life to the work of the Protheans - without their sacrifice, we would have already been processed.

Obviously they didn't anticipate exactly when it would happen, but don't you think it's slightly odd that this hyper-advanced machine race never even considered the possiblity that their usual plan might run into a hitch at some point?  It seems rather pathetic that they didn't have a reasonable plan B.

[Vikjunk]

Dave of Canada wrote...

Arijharn wrote...

But you're conveniently forgetting that access to the base in the first place was nigh impossible unless someone managed to not only discover a Derelict Reaper, but also pretty much discover it's IFF, which would be a herculean task in and of itself.

The IFF was massproduced after it was collected, Cerberus has multiple ships immediately sent to the Base. Should say... the Alliance actually believed and sided with Shepard, they could've easily gotten it from the Collector Ship or the Reaper, massproduce it and send in a fleet against the Collector Base. Aside from that one Collector Ship and two-three drones, there's no exterior defenses.

This leaves the Collector Base really exposed should anybody invade it, assuming they have more defenses on the inside is silly because the only defenses they had in the base itself were the Collectors and their pets, nothing of Reaper construct. The exterior was poorly defended, the interior is poorly defended and that most likely means the Reapers don't have any "hidden traps". Even if they did, I doubt Harbinger would've twirled his (reaper) mustache and refuse to activate it while their entire plan is falling apart.

The core itself was it's greatest defense, without said defense they pretty much had nothing.

There is the possibility that the Reapers didn’t care if the base was taken sooner or later.  You need to remember that the Collectors where used to pass on technology to other races for test subjects.  And Sovereign itself said that they purposely left technology behind so that the younger races would develop in predictable ways.  Most likely so that they would know how to counteract those technologies beforehand.

I doubt that anything other then how the Human Reaper was made was left behind that would give any real advantage to those that took the base.  It’s mostly technology that they wanted the younger races to have anyways to direct the development of them.  The lose of the base could easily be seen as an annoyance but still help promote their over all goals in the long run.

[Oblarg]

Vikjunk wrote...

Dave of Canada wrote...

Arijharn wrote...

But you're conveniently forgetting that access to the base in the first place was nigh impossible unless someone managed to not only discover a Derelict Reaper, but also pretty much discover it's IFF, which would be a herculean task in and of itself.

The IFF was massproduced after it was collected, Cerberus has multiple ships immediately sent to the Base. Should say... the Alliance actually believed and sided with Shepard, they could've easily gotten it from the Collector Ship or the Reaper, massproduce it and send in a fleet against the Collector Base. Aside from that one Collector Ship and two-three drones, there's no exterior defenses.

This leaves the Collector Base really exposed should anybody invade it, assuming they have more defenses on the inside is silly because the only defenses they had in the base itself were the Collectors and their pets, nothing of Reaper construct. The exterior was poorly defended, the interior is poorly defended and that most likely means the Reapers don't have any "hidden traps". Even if they did, I doubt Harbinger would've twirled his (reaper) mustache and refuse to activate it while their entire plan is falling apart.

The core itself was it's greatest defense, without said defense they pretty much had nothing.

There is the possibility that the Reapers didn’t care if the base was taken sooner or later.  You need to remember that the Collectors where used to pass on technology to other races for test subjects.  And Sovereign itself said that they purposely left technology behind so that the younger races would develop in predictable ways.  Most likely so that they would know how to counteract those technologies beforehand.

I doubt that anything other then how the Human Reaper was made was left behind that would give any real advantage to those that took the base.  It’s mostly technology that they wanted the younger races to have anyways to direct the development of them.  The lose of the base could easily be seen as an annoyance but still help promote their over all goals in the long run.

That still leaves the reapers without a reasonable plan B, and makes the entire second installment of the series completely irrelevant in the grand scheme of things.

[Dave of Canada]

Vikjunk wrote...

There is the possibility that the Reapers didn’t care if the base was taken sooner or later.  You need to remember that the Collectors where used to pass on technology to other races for test subjects.  And Sovereign itself said that they purposely left technology behind so that the younger races would develop in predictable ways.  Most likely so that they would know how to counteract those technologies beforehand.

They'd (the Collectors) pass on extremely useful technology but nothing too much that it would tip the scale, the Base itself was never supposed to fall into the hands of the "mortals". The predictable path ends at the Mass Relays, anything else is stuff they didn't intend for them to use and thereby throws a wrench into the Reaper's plans. Example: Protheans being able to create Relays.

Now we (the humans) have technology that Collectors used, both the tech they were giving out to other species and the tech they wanted to keep for themselves (like Seeker Swarms). Even without said technology, the base itself is a large advantage because of what can be learned from the Reaper creation proccess and their weapons.

Hell, knowing how to counter indoctrination should be enough of a slap in the face for the Reapers.

Modifié par Dave of Canada, 31 octobre 2010 - 03:40 .

[TcheQ]

Oblarg wrote...

Obviously they didn't anticipate exactly when it would happen, but don't you think it's slightly odd that this hyper-advanced machine race never even considered the possiblity that their usual plan might run into a hitch at some point?  It seems rather pathetic that they didn't have a reasonable plan B.

<sorry for the ensuing wall of text, got excited >

WEll they probably never anticipated that a team  of 3 people could kill a Reaper's Chosen (or whatever Saren called himself), or destroy an entire unit of Asari Commando's, or make a Quarian and Geth work together.

Above all the Reaper's are arrogant.  They have been created that way

It does seem a bit strange though that they would leave a dead Reaper lying around though, after all the work they did to make their species vanish.  That part to me really really does not make sense.  How could they just forget about it?  Anyway that's an issue for the writers to worm their way out of...

This is the timeline of their contingency, as I see it (and how it's laid out in ME/ME2):
Plan A
~2170, Reaper signal sent to Citadel

Plan B
Nazara signalled by Harbinger that the gate hasn't opened
Nazara assesses the situation, and the strength required to capture the Citadel - fullfrontal atack isn't possible, needs to indoctrinate someone with access to the Citadel already (lol and there is a nice contradiction here... why couldn't Saren just activate the signal)
Nazara downloads a virus to the main Geth Hub
~2180-2185?
Nazara let's Saren 'find' him. 
~2187 Geth + Nazara attack Eden Prime looking for the artifact
Attacks Fails, Nazara Dies, Harbinger mad.

Plan C
Harbinger orders the Collectors to kill  Shepard, luring the Normandy into a trap.  As an insult to the human who killed Nazara, Harbinger instructs the collectors to farm Humans to make another reaper that could infiltrate the Citadel and signal the Relay.
2189 Shepard is revived. (in a base so secret the Collectors never picked up a transmission about it, apparently)
2190 Shepard destroys the Collector Overseer, Harbinger's link to the base.

Plan D
Harbinger vewy vewy mad now.  Notice Harbinger blames organics for his failure (Collector Overseer) and never himself.  Guess we'll see what this plan is in ME3. "We will find another way"

[Oblarg]

TcheQ wrote...

Oblarg wrote...

Obviously they didn't anticipate exactly when it would happen, but don't you think it's slightly odd that this hyper-advanced machine race never even considered the possiblity that their usual plan might run into a hitch at some point?  It seems rather pathetic that they didn't have a reasonable plan B.

WEll they probably never anticipated that a team  of 3 people could kill a Reaper's Chosen (or whatever Saren called himself), or destroy an entire unit of Asari Commando's, or make a Quarian and Geth work together.

Above all the Reaper's are arrogant.  They have been created that way

It does seem a bit strange though that they would leave a dead Reaper lying around though, after all the work they did to make their species vanish.  That part to me really really does not make sense.  How could they just forget about it?  Anyway that's an issue for the writers to worm their way out of...

Pretty much, that's exactly the problem.  If you are willing to concede that they hyper-advanced machine race didn't prepare for the possiblity that their cycle may be interrupted, then the main villain of the series becomes much, much less imposing.  To me, this clearly looks like a blunder on BioWare's part, and I'm interested to see how they will try to correct it in the third game (if at all, but if they don't then the third game will have an even weaker plot than the second).

[Vikjunk]

Oblarg wrote...

Vikjunk wrote...

Dave of Canada wrote...

Arijharn wrote...

But
you're conveniently forgetting that access to the base in the first
place was nigh impossible unless someone managed to not only discover a Derelict Reaper, but also pretty much discover it's IFF, which would be a herculean task in and of itself.

The
IFF was massproduced after it was collected, Cerberus has multiple
ships immediately sent to the Base. Should say... the Alliance actually
believed and sided with Shepard, they could've easily gotten it from the
Collector Ship or the Reaper, massproduce it and send in a fleet
against the Collector Base. Aside from that one Collector Ship and
two-three drones, there's no exterior defenses.

This leaves the
Collector Base really exposed should anybody invade it, assuming they
have more defenses on the inside is silly because the only defenses they
had in the base itself were the Collectors and their pets, nothing of
Reaper construct. The exterior was poorly defended, the interior is
poorly defended and that most likely means the Reapers don't have any
"hidden traps". Even if they did, I doubt Harbinger would've twirled his
(reaper) mustache and refuse to activate it while their entire plan is
falling apart.

The core itself was it's greatest defense, without said defense they pretty much had nothing.

There
is the possibility that the Reapers didn’t care if the base was taken
sooner or later.  You need to remember that the Collectors where used to
pass on technology to other races for test subjects.  And Sovereign
itself said that they purposely left technology behind so that the
younger races would develop in predictable ways.  Most likely so that
they would know how to counteract those technologies beforehand.

I
doubt that anything other then how the Human Reaper was made was left
behind that would give any real advantage to those that took the base. 
It’s mostly technology that they wanted the younger races to have
anyways to direct the development of them.  The lose of the base could
easily be seen as an annoyance but still help promote their over all
goals in the long run.

That still leaves the reapers
without a reasonable plan B, and makes the entire second installment of
the series completely irrelevant in the grand scheme of things.

The instillation itself I personally thought was irrelevant anyways other then it gave insight into why the Reapers have their cycles of destruction.  It seems to indicate that they use organics to reproduce.  And that Husks aren’t only a scare tactic but are the most basic of Reaper reproduction.  Which they start to combine husks together to produce powerful and intelligent units like Scion and Praetorian.  Similar to how Geth are more intelligent when more programs work together.  Which is supported when Sovereign says “We are each a nation" and Harbinger saying "We are the harbinger of your profection."

And it seemed more like a pet project of Harbinger then any coherent plan.  It was trying to jumpstart the reproduction of a Reaper with using humans since it seems to have a fascination with Sheppard for being able to defeat Sovereign, so in turn it wanted to study humans because of it.  And the ending shows a fleet of Reapers making it's way to the Milky Way from dark space.

Edit:  Accidentally quoted the wrong post.

Modifié par Vikjunk, 31 octobre 2010 - 06:59 .

[TcheQ]

Oblarg wrote...
Pretty much, that's exactly the problem.  If you are willing to concede that they hyper-advanced machine race didn't prepare for the possiblity that their cycle may be interrupted, then the main villain of the series becomes much, much less imposing.  To me, this clearly looks like a blunder on BioWare's part, and I'm interested to see how they will try to correct it in the third game (if at all, but if they don't then the third game will have an even weaker plot than the second).

They haven't been stopped yet.  At this point in time, Bioware could just write "Reaper's win, regardless of what Shepard does".  That would be awesome (but counterintuitive to writing a sequel)

I said in an earlier post that "reapers do it for the lulz" - if I was an advanced species, and had been tracking potential hosts for millions of years (read: thousands of times), without ever a single reaper lost,  (except that one orbiting Mnemosyne) I would be pretty arrogant about it too.

Was there something specific that you think is a stand out example of Reaper's being dumbasses (considering they are limited to the imagination of Bioware writer's), as you seem keep making a general comment on Reaper behaviour, and not noting anything  specific.

You aren't a hyperadvanced race, so why would you understand their motives?

Modifié par TcheQ, 31 octobre 2010 - 05:24 .

[Oblarg]

TcheQ wrote...

Oblarg wrote...
Pretty much, that's exactly the problem.  If you are willing to concede that they hyper-advanced machine race didn't prepare for the possiblity that their cycle may be interrupted, then the main villain of the series becomes much, much less imposing.  To me, this clearly looks like a blunder on BioWare's part, and I'm interested to see how they will try to correct it in the third game (if at all, but if they don't then the third game will have an even weaker plot than the second).

They haven't been stopped yet.  At this point in time, Bioware could just write "Reaper's win, regardless of what Shepard does".  That would be awesome (but counterintuitive to writing a sequel)

I said in an earlier post that "reapers do it for the lulz" - if I was an advanced species, and had been tracking potential hosts for millions of years (read: thousands of times), without ever a single reaper lost,  (except that one orbiting Mnemosyne) I would be pretty arrogant about it too.

Was there something specific that you think is a stand out example of Reaper's being dumbasses (considering they are limited to the imagination of Bioware writer's), as you seem keep making a general comment on Reaper behaviour, and not noting anything  specific.

You aren't a hyperadvanced race, so why would you understand their motives?

That's a very feeble excuse - "they look like a group of bumbling fools simply because they're too deep for you" is not a good way to write a story.

[TcheQ]

Oblarg wrote...
That's a very feeble excuse - "they look like a group of bumbling fools simply because they're too deep for you" is not a good way to write a story.

Please provide a solid example of something the Reaper's have done that make you come to this conclusion. Be specific.

[SmokeyPSD]

It's cherry picking reasoning it was a cakewalk going to and doing the assault run on the Collector Base. I saw no evidence to suggest there was only ONE cruiser even then aswell, only 1 that was released and quickly destroyed. The Normandy very quickly crashed onto the surface of the base before another was launched. Just because you didn't see one doesnt mean it didnt exist.



If you aren't well prepared, you don't succeed. You suffer the same fate like countless ships have suffered before you have, either just hitting wreckage, or being made short work of by the Occuli. Let alone before even being able to skirmish with the base itself and cruiser's. The Collector's ARENT the reapers for one, but they were no weak agents of the reapers. They were far more effective than the Geth ever were. Primarily because they had only really managed to mobilise one race completely against them, and even then, a shadow organization.

[Dave of Canada]

SmokeyPSD wrote...

Primarily because they had only really managed to mobilise one race completely against them, and even then, a shadow organization.

A small group consisting of what? 60-70 people? Who managed to organize and destroy an entire species and claimed a base filled with the best tech in the galaxy? IMO, that doesn't radiate strength. The Collectors wouldn't have been that big of a threat if the Alliance / Council actually did something.

Modifié par Dave of Canada, 31 octobre 2010 - 07:38 .

[Oblarg]

TcheQ wrote...

Oblarg wrote...
That's a very feeble excuse - "they look like a group of bumbling fools simply because they're too deep for you" is not a good way to write a story.

Please provide a solid example of something the Reaper's have done that make you come to this conclusion. Be specific.

Their plan B was based on creating a human reaper with the collectors, except the collectors have a grand total of one cruiser and would have no way of accomplishing this goal in the first place.  You can't dispute that this was their plan B, because Harbinger very clearly says in an angry voice "WE WILL FIND ANOTHER WAY!" at the end of the game, implying that the collectors were theit main hope for getting in through the citadel.

In addition to this, the logic of even making another Reaper is questionable - what makes the Reapers think a human reaper would fare any better than Sovereign and his Geth fleet?  Even if the Council ignores the Reaper threat, they're certainly going to build their fleets back up.  In addition, this time the reaper wouldn't have the advantage of having a pawn in the control room to open the citadel arms for it.  It makes absolutely no sense at all.

They left one of their own dead floating around in the galaxy just waiting to be discovered, and never bothered to give their collector base adequate defenses in the event that some future organic civilization would perhaps find a way to attack it.

Sovereign expressed utter disdain for organics in the first game, yet it turns out that Reapers are actually modeled after organics.  This might not make them look like idiots, per se, but it certainly doesn't make them seem as imposing as the game would like us to believe.

SmokeyPSD wrote...

It's cherry picking reasoning it was a
cakewalk going to and doing the assault run on the Collector Base. I saw
no evidence to suggest there was only ONE cruiser even then aswell,
only 1 that was released and quickly destroyed. The Normandy very
quickly crashed onto the surface of the base before another was
launched. Just because you didn't see one doesnt mean it didnt exist.

If
you aren't well prepared, you don't succeed. You suffer the same fate
like countless ships have suffered before you have, either just hitting
wreckage, or being made short work of by the Occuli. Let alone before
even being able to skirmish with the base itself and cruiser's. The
Collector's ARENT the reapers for one, but they were no weak agents of
the reapers. They were far more effective than the Geth ever were.
Primarily because they had only really managed to mobilise one race
completely against them, and even then, a shadow organization.

"They had more cruisers, but didn't want to use them" is an absolutely silly argument with nothing to support it, especially because if you look at the collector base there's a very special socket for just that one cruiser to dock at.  Combine that with the fact that you only run into one cruiser at every other point in the game (in fact, the game goes out of its way to express how it's the same ship every time you encounter it), and it's pretty certain there's one collecter cruiser.

And even if there were more, they'd need a fleet the size of the Alliance fleet to even have a chance at taking earth, considering that a single frigate designed for stealth could take out one of their cruisers.

It's not cherrypicking at all.  The manner in which events played out was hilariously contrived and absurd to the point of breaking immersion.

Modifié par Oblarg, 31 octobre 2010 - 07:41 .

[SmokeyPSD]

I think your argument is silly, by process of absense. So we're even. It's a huge ship, just because there's one hole doesn't mean there's a process for many to launch. IF there is only one hole. We only see one.



Harbinger would not have expected the ship to be so readily destroyed.

[Oblarg]

SmokeyPSD wrote...

I think your argument is silly, by process of absense. So we're even. It's a huge ship, just because there's one hole doesn't mean there's a process for many to launch. IF there is only one hole. We only see one.

Harbinger would not have expected the ship to be so readily destroyed.

Watch the cutscene again, it's pretty obvious that's the only ship in that hole, you can pore over pictures of the base all you want, there's only one hole.

And if Harbinger didn't expect his ship to be so easily destroyed, then that's another blow to the integrity of the series' main antagonists.  After all, the Normandy is able to destroy it with frigate-class weapons unupgraded, and with cruiser-class firepower if you upgraded.  Neither of those are beyond what any other race at the time would have, anywhere in the cycle.

Of course, what's even more absurd is that you immediately hook the IFF up to the normandy after acquiring it and fly through the relay solo instead of bringing it back and duplicating it and gathering intel - in many ways, the situation would be less absurd if Cerberus had, for example, sent a probe through the relay and learned beforehand that the defenses were so light (though that still makes the Reapers seem a lot less imposing than they did in the first game).  Unfortunately, this isn't the case, and thus it seems like a magical stars-aligning miracle that you manage to destroy the base so easily.

Generally, it's not a good idea to make your main villians seem less threatening in the second part of a trilogy, but that's exactly what BioWare did in ME2.

Modifié par Oblarg, 31 octobre 2010 - 07:54 .

[TcheQ]

Oblarg wrote...

Their plan B was based on creating a human reaper with the collectors, except the collectors have a grand total of one cruiser and would have no way of accomplishing this goal in the first place.  You can't dispute that this was their plan B, because Harbinger very clearly says in an angry voice "WE WILL FIND ANOTHER WAY!" at the end of the game, implying that the collectors were theit main hope for getting in through the citadel.

In addition to this, the logic of even making another Reaper is questionable - what makes the Reapers think a human reaper would fare any better than Sovereign and his Geth fleet?  Even if the Council ignores the Reaper threat, they're certainly going to build their fleets back up.  In addition, this time the reaper wouldn't have the advantage of having a pawn in the control room to open the citadel arms for it.  It makes absolutely no sense at all.

They left one of their own dead floating around in the galaxy just waiting to be discovered, and never bothered to give their collector base adequate defenses in the event that some future organic civilization would perhaps find a way to attack it.

Sovereign expressed utter disdain for organics in the first game, yet it turns out that Reapers are actually modeled after organics.  This might not make them look like idiots, per se, but it certainly doesn't make them seem as imposing as the game would like us to believe.

At present we don't know why they were even making another reaper.  One logical conclusion is that the only way to re-activate the Citadel is if a Reaper does it.  Why have they failed three times?  They underestimated organics (the collectors, then the humans).  If the reapers could foresee every eventuality, then there would be no game to play.  Their achilles heel is underestimation (in fact, you will probably see this plot device in every "stop the baddie" scenario).  If they were perfect (which they aren't they are simply created to believe they are the pinnacle of evolution).

To argue it further is a bit like saying "i don't enjoy mass effect because the physics are wrong".  Sure they are wrong, but does that make the game less fun?

There could be explanations for this.  Maybe the Mnemosyne reaper FTL communication system was destroyed when it was impacted.  We don't even know if TIM's sotry about finding the Reaper is legitimate (for all we know, he could be working under the shroud of  a creature that feeds off reapers or something O_O).
 
We know they are killable in other ways, like whatever doomsday weapon had been created to destroy that particular reaper.  Even if it is not explained in such detail in Mass Effect 3 I am willing to overlook the positioning of Mnemosyne Reaper for this reason, and because it was cool to get a throwback to MAss Effect  (you drive on a moon that revolves around a planet that has a scar cause by a Mass Effect weapon)

The last thing I would do is type out a knee-jerk reaction that every detail of ME hasn't been explained.  FTL isn't explained, and Mass Effect Relays aren't explained.  Biotic field barriers aren't explained.  We know what they do, but we don't need to know how they work (no amount of sci-fi writing will convince me)

One thing I am not entirely sure of is where the notion of "more reapers are coming'.  Where did that information come from?  HOw did they get the statistics on Harbinger?  There are a lot of questions I have, but I won't accuse the writers of being substandard if the details explained in ME3 don't meet my own standards of plot continuity.  For me, I've only ever taken on one at a time, more than one Nazara and everyone would be toast - it killed over eight thousand in mere minutes.  My view of the Reapers is still that of Vigils warning.  They are monnstrous in battle, but this doesn't mean they are of infinite intellect.  Until ME3 has been completed, we could run around in circles for days on end guessing what the Reaper's true intentions are, and until the final line of script has been published, I'm not going to judge whether the story has plotholes till then.