140 réponses à ce sujet

[Element_Zero]

Perhaps it's more of a 'face' thing. . . If you understand some of Asia culture you will understand what I'm talking about.

When Shepard died the council decided it was best to downplay things as much as possible. This could be from internal pressure from 1 or 2 of the representatives (who are harboring something) or external from conflicting interests of the support structure / people.

I tend to think it's from external pressure more than from internal which is why they started their campaign to reduce the 'Reaper' threat and rename it the 'Spector / Geth' threat. Now that Shepard is back I'm sure they want to save face and still keep their underlying support from faltering. Since in the realm of politics, Shepard could still hold considerable influence or sway in public opinion for saving the council. And those who don't know the full story might think the council let Shepard die. It boils down to they are going to feel their jobs are threatened.

All of the above depends on the value the other species have in reguards to leadership and how they preceive Shepard.

Now if you didn't save the council, you must understand those other species are going to see it as a raw coup. They are always going to ask why did you let our representatives die. Rancor and ruckus is going to ensue due to the fact the aliens lost their influence rather abruptly. And thus the 'human' council is going to have their hands tied trying to maintain control, reestablishing commerce, and contact with the leading members of the other species. Funny thing is Shepard is going to remain in high regards with humans who were seeking more influence in these things. And the council is going to feel threatened again, since Shepard is popular with humans.

Modifié par Element_Zero, 18 janvier 2011 - 03:24 .

[wulf3n]

Element_Zero wrote...
Now if you didn't save the council, you must understand those other species are going to see it as a raw coup. They are always going to ask why did you let our representatives die. Rancor and ruckus is going to ensue due to the fact the aliens lost their influence rather abruptly. And thus the 'human' council is going to have their hands tied trying to maintain control, reestablishing commerce, and contact with the leading members of the other species. Funny thing is Shepard is going to remain in high regards with humans who were seeking more influence in these things. And the council is going to feel threatened again, since Shepard is popular with humans.

This is why i see ME2 as a missed oppurtunity. Your decisions through ME1 should have had an impact on how ME2 started. i.e.


Saved Council: Council are trying to stop reapers, believe collectors may have something to do with reapers, send you off to find out.
Council Die: New council don't believe in reapers, in their ignorance you are tempted by cerberus who do believe you, and send you off to stop the collectors.

or something much better.

at least then i could have put up with the whole "So no one wants to acknowledge the reaper threat still?" because it would have been my fault, and i would have felt my actions actually meant something, and that i wasn't just repeating ME1

Modifié par wulf3n, 18 janvier 2011 - 03:27 .

[ReiSilver]

I understand why it was done from a gameplay stand point, make the player feel like everyone is against them so they have to 'go it alone' or in this case force you to work for cerberus but I think the cost to respect for the Council is too high.
In ME 1, as many have said, it makes sense. In ME2 it left many people feeling like the Council are stupid, which is not what you want for a believable universe. In the first novel and the first game all signs point to the Council NOT stupid but also not the type that everyone is going to agree with and that's where you want to keep it.
If it doesn't turn out that the Council have been taking their own steps to fight the Reapers and are just not telling Shepard about it I'll be pretty disapointed and I'll feel like the writers are pandering to Shepard as the 'last best hope for the galaxy' waaaay to much. I like feeling like the hero but I don't want to feel like the only darn compentant person in the galaxy.

[ReiSilver]

wulf3n wrote...

Saved Council: Council are trying to stop reapers, believe collectors may have something to do with reapers, send you off to find out.
Council Die: New council don't believe in reapers, in their ignorance you are tempted by cerberus who do believe you, and send you off to stop the collectors.

I would have loved to see something like this. Completely divergent story lines based on your choices would have been great, certainly better than 'oops you died, now you work for Cerberus, don't like it? Too bad.'. The only reason not to do something like that is the time and money in making what is basically two games though I really hope they do something drastic like that for ME3, being the last hurrah of the series... but I doubt they will.

[InvincibleHero]

In ME2 it would have made much more sense to say we believe the threat, but have to operate more covertly. If we make big reactions in preparation, the reapers may decide to attack before we are ready. SO Shepard has to go to black ops Cerberus and that's that.

[Slayer299]

jeweledleah wrote...
who is to say that ME3 doesn't start with Shepard in council chambers playing back the data recorded by his omnitool to the council?  we do not see it in Mass effect 2, but it doesn't mean that it will not happen.

edited to add - COuncil might have decided that Sovereign was an isolated incident, seeing as how Shep dissapears, presumed dead and for 2 years all they are doing is cleaning up isolated packs of Geth.  No sign of more Reapers.  whatsovever.  collectors were apparently known entities long before any metnion of Reapers, they just show up so rarely that no everyone actualy beleives that they exists, but them predating reaper knowledge makes them unconnected to reapers in council's eyes.

lastly - they already established how they feel about defending human or any colonies, really that are too close to Terminus systems or, outright outside of council space.

But why have the Council walking around with the Idiot 8-ball though? someone else had mentioned this and I think it fits here; why not just have the Council tell Shep that they can't talk about it with him becaue he's with Cerberus or any number of other statements that don't just outright deny Shep and say he's crazy? In the context of ME2 it would accomplish 2 things; one is that your reason for working with Cerberus doesn't feel like you're being completely railroaded and two - that the Council aren't just walking morons with a scientific/tech staff that are even DUMBER than they are.  Because it makes so much sense that the CC couldn't get any of Sovereign's remains or what they did find was nothing different than what is aboard any other ship.

[Il Divo]

Moiaussi wrote...

The hull fragments would be older than Prothean and a lot older than Geth.

Aye, but ME2 tells us they couldn't get anything conclusive on the dating.

They can, but not two years later by the start of ME2, after they have reverse engineered the weapons within two years and the result is so easy to refit that a police officer can construct them and refit them onto a foreign warship in negligible time in deep space using only parts he can fabricate on said scout vessel.

And there is still the dating issue.

I don't get it. What does this demonstrate? Yes, they reverse engineered a thanix cannon. How would reverse engineering stop them from saying "state of the art geth tech"? If I reverse engineer a brand new computer, that doesn't prove it's millions of years old.

And yet there was a prothean recording that predicted exactly that. Evidence you continue to dismiss. By mid ME2, Shepard finds another beacon.  

What evidence? It was a vision, a dream, inadmissible for most people, as Saren tells us. The Council thought Shepard's visions were driving him insane. His visions predicted the coming of the Reapers. They did not come, so how was he proven right?  

...If traces of Reapers are impossible to find, then Reapers cannot exist. That's how it goes. I can say that demons exist, but they use 'magic' to hid from us. Well, it makes sense, but how do you prove the existence of a demon if there's nothing you can point to?  

So you are saying that until it was proven otherwise, the world really was flat?  No proof does not equate to 'cannot exist.' Besides, there was proof. Shepard comes across the derelect reaper hull in ME1. And again, there was the beacon.

Yes! That's exactly how scientific revolutions occur! For all intents and purposes, people thought the world was flat so they built their lives around that assumption. For the world at that time, it was true until someone proved their belief false. Read up on Thomas Kuhn's scientific paradigms to understand how that works. That's how all systems of belief work. Let's say Santa Clause actually was real, but there's no evidence we can point to, how can you or I possibly conclude anything besides 'Santa Clause is not real'? No evidence of Santa Clause means Santa Clause does not exist. No evidence of Reapers means Reapers do not exist until proven otherwise.

There is also all the evidence that Liara had found, that was being dismissed simply because noone wanted to take a serious look at it.  There is another beacon found in ME2, intact this time and therefore with no excuse that it was some sort of explosion induced dream.... not when it sends identical images. There is evidence out there.

As Didymos points out, Liara's 'evidence' revolved around mere possibilities, and contradicted the findings of every major Prothean expert in the galaxy. Liara, as she herself admits, is regarded as a child which doesn't help matters. I'd also like to refer you to her conversation with Shepard about the original beacon and how there's a very good chance that most people would have been driven insane by contact with it. Shepard, as a strong willed invididual, is an exception. I also think someone jokingly put out the suggestion that we don't know how the Prothean beacons functioned. They could easily have been the Prothean version of a horror movie.

The council also believed they were invincible before meeting the Rachni. They should have learned not to be so sure of themselves. It doesn not matter if it is Reapers coming or AI fluffy bunnies. They know for a fact that they don't know everything that is out there. A prior civilization that was wiped out entirely (unless you count the collectors) left a warning.

So it's an argument to potentiality? 'Reapers could exist, the Council is not omniscient, so they should accept the Reapers as real'? Shepard is the only one with access to the warning. No one else! And 'wiped out' is a loaded word. No prothean expert, Liara included, had been able to unearth where the Protheans went, so 'mysteriously disappeared' is all we can conclude.

Yes, the Council 'doesn't know everything'. No person knows everything. The Rachni offered a completely different scenario. Before the Rachni attack, if someone said 'Rachni exist' we would say they are crazy. There was 'no evidence'. After the attack, there is now evidence. There is something we can point to and say "This is a Rachni, it attacked us". Reapers have no such evidence. The Council knew Saren was dangerous, that he was searching for the Conduit, and had something bad in store. They knew of Sovereign's existence. After the attack, we can point to Sovereign and say "Saren attacked us with a super powerful space ship". That's all. Meanwhile, Shepard is intent on convincing them that the ship is 'alive' when only he spoke to it.

I mean, it's like those old cartoons with the dancing frog which plays dead in front of everyone. Until you see it dance, you have no reason to assume it's anything other than dead.  

They are not merely questioning whether the images Shepard got from the beacon were real, but whether all the other evidence the team came across is real (including the information relayed by Vigil, which wasn't a 'dream').

Keeping in mind that the Council had no problem before rejecting the eye witness testimony of a dockworker about Saren being on Eden Prime. Also keeping in mind that the Council couldn't access Vigil. Shepard: "Listen, my squad can back me up. If you go to Ilos, you'll find all the evidence you'll need from the VI Vigil". Council: "Okay, Shepard, we'll check it out." And nothing pans out.

Not to mention that Vigil's information (when coming from Shepard) still amounts to more crazy talk. Detailed crazy talk, but crazy nonetheless telling us that the Citadel is a giant relay, the Conduit was a counter-attack to the Reaper threat, etc.

Questioning the images from the beacon I understand, but the rest of it comes down to essentially calling Shepard's entire squad liars. Even the 'saren set up a hoax' schtick doesn't cut it. Saren found a prothean VI which he conveniently knew how to reprogram to present the reaper story, and then not just run out of power, but noone is able to figure out how to power it or how saren managed any of that? Or why saren would have such a VI set up precisely there rather than pretty much anywhere else where the story might actually help him somehow?

But misled by Saren actually works as a theory! Every direct source of evidence Shepard would like to show (Vigil, Sovereign speaking, to a much lesser extent the beacon) is conveniently unavailable. At this point, they're rolling their eyes and walking away. That's why the Asari Councilor's response is so appropriate: "We believe that you believe it, but that doesn't make it true".

Saren's bit on vermire could have been a hoax. I mean anyone could set up to project a hologram in a specific place like that, but Vigil was too elabourate in too strange a place.

And was also shut down. Vigil, if active, I concede would have been evidence against the Reapers. But he wasn't active. "Existing in a strange place" is not evidence of Reapers. The reason why the Protheans chose Ilos for research into the Conduit had nothing to do with Reapers. The Conduit's existence had nothing to do with Reapers. It was the smallest amount of luck that the Protheans discovered what happened and teleported themselves to the Citadel.  

Modifié par Il Divo, 18 janvier 2011 - 04:23 .

[lovgreno]

To OP: Yeah it got a bit annoying at times, especialy considering how ME1 ended. But they needed a quick exuse to make Shepard choices limited to working for Cerberus. That's basicaly all there is to it I think.



If I know BioWare right they will try a new concept in ME3 though. No reason to assume that they will stick to the ME2 way of telling a story.

[Il Divo]

Moiaussi wrote...

Who cares if Sovereign was sentient?

Pretty important since that's one of the underlying characteristics in what defines a 'Reaper'.

Does it really matter if it was a manned ship or an AI ship? If so, how?

Yes it does. They were attacked by a Geth fleet. Odds on are that Sovereign could easily have been crewed by Geth.

What evidence is there that the race that built sovereign is itself extinct? None.

....Reverse reasoning. What evidence is there that the Protheans are extinct? Answer: No one could locate them until Shepard discovered the Collectors.

Is it reasonable to conclude that if said race still exists, they might be xenophobic? Yes, the Council has met xenophobic races before.

That's nice, but Shepard didn't tell them, in Mass Effect 1 or 2, anything close to this. He insists Sovereign was alive. In lieu of a change in position, and in lie of evidence of  observance of this 'shy' crew, that it was crewed by Geth is more than satisfactory.

Is it reasonable to conclude that Sovereign isn't of Geth design? Yes. Its capabilities are vastly superior to those of any of the Geth vessels.

It certainly is out of place.

Is there an alternative explaination? Yes, far fetched as it might sound, Shepard's story of the Reapers.

Which has more than a few holes of its own, to be fair.

Note that the Reapers do not have to be AI's, nor individualy immortal. All they have to do is exist, have more such ships and be xenophobic. It could turn out that the Protheans really were the first to go down, and the Reapers are just a renegade band of Protheans. The truth doesn't have to be as far fetched as Shepard's story to still be a threat.

How Is it not worth pursuing this, or at least as an investigation?

Shepard could not prove the existence of other Reaper vessels coming from dark space, he refused to deviate from his story of sentient ships, and died which put an end to the investigation. It doesn't fall to the Council to fill in the pieces of Shepard's theory when he's the one who apparently has all the evidence. "Shepard is crazy, but we'll say it was caused by a race of xenophobic aliens" doesn't cut it when after Virmire he already told them what he thought of the threat.

[jeweledleah]

Slayer299 wrote...

jeweledleah wrote...
who is to say that ME3 doesn't start with Shepard in council chambers playing back the data recorded by his omnitool to the council?  we do not see it in Mass effect 2, but it doesn't mean that it will not happen.

edited to add - COuncil might have decided that Sovereign was an isolated incident, seeing as how Shep dissapears, presumed dead and for 2 years all they are doing is cleaning up isolated packs of Geth.  No sign of more Reapers.  whatsovever.  collectors were apparently known entities long before any metnion of Reapers, they just show up so rarely that no everyone actualy beleives that they exists, but them predating reaper knowledge makes them unconnected to reapers in council's eyes.

lastly - they already established how they feel about defending human or any colonies, really that are too close to Terminus systems or, outright outside of council space.

But why have the Council walking around with the Idiot 8-ball though? someone else had mentioned this and I think it fits here; why not just have the Council tell Shep that they can't talk about it with him becaue he's with Cerberus or any number of other statements that don't just outright deny Shep and say he's crazy? In the context of ME2 it would accomplish 2 things; one is that your reason for working with Cerberus doesn't feel like you're being completely railroaded and two - that the Council aren't just walking morons with a scientific/tech staff that are even DUMBER than they are.  Because it makes so much sense that the CC couldn't get any of Sovereign's remains or what they did find was nothing different than what is aboard any other ship.

this too can happen, however.... you ARE railroaded into working with cerberus before you have a chance to talk with a council, so concider this...they are now aware whom you're working with.  they mistrust cerberus.  you've been missing for 2 years, and you have weird glowing scars and while geneticaly you scan as Shepard, there is no concise proof that you haven't been tampered with in some fashion.  they cannot trust you.  maybe they decide that they cannot even tell you much?  Even Anderson, who is admitedly much warmer to you then either council or Udian - doesn't tell you everything.  you cannot get out of working with Cerberus at the time, and you haven't had a chance to prove to the Council that they can trust you still.  sure they reinstate your Spectre status (assuming you accept that pretyt empty gesture), but on condition that you stick to Terminus systems and don't expect actual tangible support from them.  Its quite possible that they will be unwilling to open up untill they see that you broke ties with Cerberus and brought proof  (now imagine if you DIDN'T destroy the base - this could be an interesting twist on your relationship with the council right there, in ME3)

we're not seeing the full picture.  yet.

[Ahriman]

Are they overdoing the whole "no one believes you" thing? No

Are they overdoing "Shepard cannot bring real evidence" thing? Yes.

[Arijharn]

Sajuro wrote...

Arijharn wrote...

Sajuro wrote...

One person needs to believe in you so you can believe in the them that believes in you

Kamina from Tenga Toppa Gurren Lagaan?

I would settle for someone to tell Shepard to clench his jaw and punch him when he's given up (Bonus points if it is al-Jilani)
-Shepard is sitting in the normandy after everyone left, when he sees al-Jilani-
Shepard: Come to rub it in? -gets punched and knocked to the ground by her-
al-Jilani: So that's it? -rubbing her fist- You're just going to give up? The Reapers win?
Shepard: Well what do you want me to do? We lost the Citadel. -tries to get up but gets punched again- what was that for?
al-Jilani: What's the matter, did a Krogan take your quad? Call me when the Shepard who stopped Sovereign gets back. -turns to walk away-
Shepard: There are thousands of them? What the **** do you want me to do? I'm just one person -gets hit again-
al-Jilani: -muttering-damn that feels good -speaks up- You're commander mother-fraking Shepard, you didn't come all this way to give up, did you? -Shepard silent, looking away. al-Jilani grabs his face and forces him to look at her- don't believe in yourself! Believe in the me who believes in you! Yours is the will that will pierce the heavens and burst into a new tomorrow! Who the hell are you? Jacob Taylor?
Shepard: -stands up- you're right.
al-Jilani: of course I'm right, I used a paragon dialogue option -gets punched by Shepard and knocked to the ground-
Shepard: And that's for hitting me, and that false accusation of me being Jacob. -walks out of the room to rally a resistance-

I will accept all of this if I get to be in a gigantic robot that is larger than a galaxy, and I get to throw galaxies at the bad guy... oh, and I get to combine some galaxies into a big bang type energy ball.

[In Exile]

wulf3n wrote...
If your accountant said that as 3 guys with super powers were going around trying to save the world i'd start believing her.

Remind me never to trust you with anything involving fact-checking.

Komodo? Dinosaurs?

Lizards. Fire. Things that fly.

The idea behind what i'm saying is, if the technology exists, why is it so hard to believe it exists in some other form.

Because we are not asking the Council to believe AI exist. We are not even asking the Council to believe that civlizations predate us.

Instead, we are asking the Council to believe that some untold amount of time ago, some machine-like race of AIs appeared and anihilated all life in the galaxy. Then, they've created everything that modern technology is based on, systematically eradicated all galactic developed life every 50,000 years so perfectly no one ever figured it out, and have been doing it for so long it is not even coinceivable when the cycle started.

And we are asking them to believe this, in ME1, with no evidence for it.

Moiaussi wrote...

Who cares if Sovereign was sentient?

Does
it really matter if it was a manned ship or an AI ship? If so, how?

What
evidence is there that the race that built sovereign is itself extinct?
None.

At the time the Council "suddenly" believes in the Reapers in ME1, there is no evidence of any of this.

In ME2, it's just shoddy writting.

Is it reasonable to conclude that Sovereign isn't of Geth design? Yes.
Its capabilities are vastly superior to those of any of the Geth
vessels.

This, however, continues to be a stupid reason.

There are reasons to conclude that Sovereign isn't a geth ship - a detailed analysis of its structure and a comparison to salvaged geth technology.

Because it can do fancy **** isn't a good reason.

Is there an alternative explaination? Yes, far fetched as it might
sound, Shepard's story of the Reapers.

Here's a better, less crazy, theory. The Protheans are back, and they're pissed.

Look at all the facts - Sovereign would like be as old as circa the Citadel. The technology and material could be similar. The dominant theory of the day is that the Protheans developed all advanced technology.

Here's an even less crazy theory. Saren, determined to become God-Emperor of the Galaxy, finds a working Prothean weapon of mass destruction - the greatest weapon they've ever developed. He convinces the Geth that this is an advanced AI - the pinnacle of their existence. He recruits them as an army to defeat the Council and install himself as ruler.

There you go. Far-fetched, but less so, theories than the reapers.

Look, dude - when you start allowing totally insane theories through the window that happen to fit the facts, other totally insane theories that happen to fit the facts can also be allowed in.

We can even go for more of your rhetorical questions?

Did the Protheans design the Mass Relays? As far as the galaxy knows - yes.
Does Sovereign appear based on Mass Relay Technology? Yes - reapers have a mass effect core, etc.
Did it seem like the ship, Sovereign, could somehow 'interact' with the Citadel? Yes.
Was the Citadel built by the Protheans? Yes!
Was Saren on Ilos, a Prothean world, before attacking the Council? Certainly.
Did Saren, in attacking Eden Prime, secure a working Prothean beacon? Yes.
Did Saren, on Feros, secure knowledge of the culture of the Protheans? Yes!

It all adds up! Saren found a Prothean warship that matches the design of the relays!

Note that the Reapers do not have to be AI's, nor individualy
immortal. All they have to do is exist, have more such ships and be
xenophobic. It could turn out that the Protheans really were the first
to go down, and the Reapers are just a renegade band of Protheans. The
truth doesn't have to be as far fetched as Shepard's story to still be a
threat.

How Is it not worth pursuing this, or at least as
an investigation?

Because by the standard of evidence you present, these other theories are not just as well grounded, but even better grounded, because they rely on things we already "know" are true.

Aside from Shepard's ramblings, that is. And the Council never bought them.

Modifié par In Exile, 18 janvier 2011 - 06:28 .

[In Exile]

wulf3n wrote...

Saved Council: Council are trying to stop reapers, believe collectors may have something to do with reapers, send you off to find out.
Council Die: New council don't believe in reapers, in their ignorance you are tempted by cerberus who do believe you, and send you off to stop the collectors.

That would be an even bigger plothole than the ME1 switch plothole, since Udina and Anderson both 100% buy into the reaper theory.

[Mariquis]

I definitely agree with those who say that it wasn't overdone. My disbelief was at the end of ME1 when suddenly the council went "Good on you Shepard! We'll get those damn reapers!"

The truth of the matter is that at that point they didn't have any more proof than they did before (which is what someone said previously as well). The meeting occurred right after the attack which means techs wouldn't have had a had a chance to analyze Sovereign yet, especiallly considering the thousands of people being killed and the station absolutely blown apart. Yet for some reason they believe you unconditionally? I'm assuming they did that to make the player feel completely accomplished. What they should have thought was that Saren, the rogue spectre who had designs on galactic conquest, actually acted upon his intentions and, you know, attacked the seat of galactic control.

Also no, they have no way of proving the claims that Sovereign is a sentient immortal destroyer of worlds etc. They said they couldn't get any solid dating on the materials it was made of. It is not a stretch at all to think that the keepers were programmed to remove any evidence of the Reapers (Anderson comments on how surprisingly efficient they were at helping clean the citadel), removing a lot of incriminating stuff. And no, there is nothing to say that the geth didn't create sovereign. The geth, an extremely advanced AI, spent 200 years developing in isolation. The tech they develop may not even be close to what the council races develop.  Think about it this way, 200 years ago electicity as a concept was only just being explored, and 100 years ago electricity was still not commonly in use. Now electricity is ubiquitous in first world nations, we have AIs equivalent to children, and have flown to the moon.  HUGE developments can occur over 200 years, especially when you throw a hyper advanced AI in the mix.

Also no one spoke to sovereign but Saren, Shepard's crew, and Shepard. Liara says herself that she is young and inexperienced, and when you ask her for proof on extinction cycles she says that she doesn't have any real proof, but she just feels like it's what happened, and she's the only history expert there. Everyone else coudl be considered duped in the same way you were.

This also brings up the interesting question, when Asari mind meld, do they see what actually happened, or what the individual THOUGHT they saw.  i.e. if they melded with someone who suffered from hallucinations would they  see the hallucinations or reality?   So even if the council asari read shepard's mind of what have you could that indicate truth?  So the beacons, which only Saren and Shepard experienced could be completely farcical. Vigil was disabled when they got there, it could have been a ruse set up by Saren to buy him time, after all, just a couple moments more and Saren could have easily won.

For the person who pointed out "I can't believe there weren't cameras that saw cyber-Saren"  Well..Saren is an experienced spectre, he could have easily shot out any cameras, the geth could have shot out any cameras, with all the electronics that were likely shorting out due to the electronics the cameras could have just fried, there was also that bit with the giant chunks of soverign smashing all over the citadel including directly into the council chamber.  Probably would have destroyed any external cameras.  We also know that no one properly understands the inner mechanisms of the citadel, and it is illegal to muck with the keepers, so do they have 'built in' security devices? I dunno.

Even in the off chance that for some reason sovereign's attack did miraculously change their mind at the end of ME1, two years have passed with.. what?

Nothing.  No advanced starships coming to attack, declining geth attacks, nothing particularly out of the ordinary.  Maybe their adrenaline fueled adherence to Shepard's beliefs came undone after no proof came forward after two years.

Alternately, maybe they are acting behind the scenes and refuse to let Shepard be part of that information because she's working with Cerberus, certainly plausible.  They do not broadcast the info to the galaxy because it would cause mass hysteria. We know that some higher up groups know about the reapers (or have at least heard of them, regardless of whether they think it is reaper tech or geth tech. Dr. McCoy's (was that his name?) comrade during the firewalker project, and the Salarian STG (which someone else mentioned,  I believe), so maybe Shepard just isn't privy to it.

ALTERNATELY, the council could be indoctrined via sovereign chunks (two years have passed, the cerberus team on the dead reaper didn't even last that long), or perhaps the citadel had the potential for indoctrination all along. Who knows!

Overall, no it's completely reasonable for the council to deny the existance of reapers. What was unrealistic was their acceptance of it in the first game.
 

[Slayer299]

jeweledleah wrote...
this too can happen, however.... you ARE railroaded into working with cerberus before you have a chance to talk with a council, so concider this...they are now aware whom you're working with.  they mistrust cerberus.  you've been missing for 2 years, and you have weird glowing scars and while geneticaly you scan as Shepard, there is no concise proof that you haven't been tampered with in some fashion.  they cannot trust you.  maybe they decide that they cannot even tell you much?  Even Anderson, who is admitedly much warmer to you then either council or Udian - doesn't tell you everything.  you cannot get out of working with Cerberus at the time, and you haven't had a chance to prove to the Council that they can trust you still.  sure they reinstate your Spectre status (assuming you accept that pretyt empty gesture), but on condition that you stick to Terminus systems and don't expect actual tangible support from them.  Its quite possible that they will be unwilling to open up untill they see that you broke ties with Cerberus and brought proof  (now imagine if you DIDN'T destroy the base - this could be an interesting twist on your relationship with the council right there, in ME3)

we're not seeing the full picture.  yet.

I understand what you're saying, I just find it very difficult to accept because the railroading is done so blatantly that you're not even given the illusion of having a choice. To have Shep blindly trust TIM is one of my biggest problems with ME2 and working with Cerb. Having the CC shoot you down because they know you are working with TIM isn't a problem, it gives that dilemma of either not doing anything at all but letting human colonies continue to be attacked or work with TIM and Cerby to stop them. The same goes for the CC or Anderson not wanting to trust you because of those ties, its the idiot ball that has the Turian Councillor saying "Ah yes....." and then talkinga bout how crazy Shep really is.

In ME1 havint the CC not believe you about Saren made total sense, no evidence but your so-called vision. The same goes *mostly* after Virmire, you had proof of Saren wanting to attack the Citadel even if they didn't want to send a fleet to Ilos (only Udina shuts you down).

In ME2 it *should* (in my opinion) have been "no, we can't talk to you because of Cerberus" not "Ahh, yes...." and "You're crazy". Anderson does what the CC should have done with this when he tells you virtually nothing about Ash/Kaiden and why. So why back to square one?

I know you can't answer the 'why' question, it just really bugs me is all.

[Sandbox47]

Pfft. Nerds.

Imagine if someone told you that huga machines wanted to wipe out the advanced life in the galaxy? No way I'd believe that. Well, maybe I would, but I wouldn't much care either way. My motivations are different from "normal".

[Aeowyn]

Yes, the stereotype of bullheaded politicians is getting tiresome.



And they won't believe you even if you have Legion with you who tells them that "geth do not have that kind of technology [to build Sovereign]".

[Arijharn]

Sandbox47 wrote...

Imagine if someone told you that huga machines wanted to wipe out the advanced life in the galaxy? No way I'd believe that.

That's pretty true. It should be at least considered as true though since it's spoken by one of their Spectre's, but I think this proves beyond anything else that Shephard's induction has more to do with political reasons than their actual belief that humanity was ready for it. Shephard's induction into the Spectre's raises the ghost (har!) of Harkin's induction into C-Sec imo.

[Ahriman]

Aeowyn wrote...

And they won't believe you even if you have Legion with you who tells them that "geth do not have that kind of technology [to build Sovereign]".

Actually C-Sec must shoot him when they see him. Geth freely walking on Citadel already is a plothole, so it cannot be considered as evidence.

[wulf3n]

In Exile wrote...
Remind me never to trust you with anything involving fact-checking. 

Apparently you didn't get the biblical reference...oh well.

In Exile wrote...
Lizards. Fire. Things that fly.

Lizards don't fly and nothing breathes fire? how are "dragons" made up of RELEVANT things that exist?
Everything the reapers are exists in the ME universe.

In Exile wrote...
Because we are not asking the Council to believe AI exist. We are not even asking the Council to believe that civlizations predate us.

just both together...OMG that's so hard to believe!!!!!!!

In Exile wrote...
Instead, we are asking the Council to believe that some untold amount of time ago, some machine-like race of AIs appeared and anihilated all life in the galaxy. Then, they've created everything that modern technology is based on, systematically eradicated all galactic developed life every 50,000 years so perfectly no one ever figured it out, and have been doing it for so long it is not even coinceivable when the cycle started.

The exact details are moot, how old, how long, and how often is irrelevant in the light of the strong possibility, and the danger it poses.

In Exile wrote...
That would be an even bigger plothole than the ME1 switch plothole, since Udina and Anderson both 100% buy into the reaper theory. 

but they're 1/4 of a council what they believe is irrelevant, it's what the group believes and the new group has no reason to trust shepard, the old council does.

Modifié par wulf3n, 18 janvier 2011 - 08:39 .

[Arijharn]

The point, wulf3n, I think they're trying to make is that because they can not independently verify the statements that Shephard has brought up, they can not assume he is telling you the truth (or it could be some distortion of it)

Example; if you couldn't verify my statement that harvester machinery had sapience and were plotting to kill everyone, would you assume that I'm telling you the truth? Throw in politics behind it, and then the question you have to ask yourself is if it would be in your interest of telling the populace that harvester machinery had sapience and were plotting to kill everyone, I mean... that could incite panic could it not?

[Moiaussi]

Il Divo wrote...

Aye, but ME2 tells us they couldn't get anything conclusive on the dating.

And that isn't a plot hole in and of its self?

I don't get it. What does this demonstrate? Yes, they reverse engineered a thanix cannon. How would reverse engineering stop them from saying "state of the art geth tech"? If I reverse engineer a brand new computer, that doesn't prove it's millions of years old.

If you could build that brand new computer from spare parts in a couple hours in the middle of nowhere, and the lack of doing such a simple task to update your fleets targetting systems cost you a war, you would be a complete idiot, wouldn't you? The Geth didn't refit their ships even though  we know how insanely easy it would have been for them to do so.

If they had done so they almost certainly would have had enough firepower to beat both the Council fleet and Alliance reinforcements without needing Sovereign's help (other than the initial surprise).

The concept that Sovereign was a Geth ship therefore relies on the Geth being morons, which is hard to believe if they built sovereign.

What evidence? It was a vision, a dream, inadmissible for most people, as Saren tells us. The Council thought Shepard's visions were driving him insane. His visions predicted the coming of the Reapers. They did not come, so how was he proven right?

In the case of the beacon on Eden, only Shepard was able to get the vision and even then it was questionable, since it was transmitted via the beacon's explosion.

Multiple people all having exactly the same vision provides evidence that it is something other than their own imaginations.

Yes! That's exactly how scientific revolutions occur! For all intents and purposes, people thought the world was flat so they built their lives around that assumption. For the world at that time, it was true until someone proved their belief false. Read up on Thomas Kuhn's scientific paradigms to understand how that works. That's how all systems of belief work. Let's say Santa Clause actually was real, but there's no evidence we can point to, how can you or I possibly conclude anything besides 'Santa Clause is not real'? No evidence of Santa Clause means Santa Clause does not exist. No evidence of Reapers means Reapers do not exist until proven otherwise.

 
Strange... people die of bullets they don't see coming all the time. People die of carbon monoxide poisoning, or other forms of poisoning without ever needing to see evidence before hand and without needing to believe such things exist. The world is not existential.

As Didymos points out, Liara's 'evidence' revolved around mere possibilities, and contradicted the findings of every major Prothean expert in the galaxy. Liara, as she herself admits, is regarded as a child which doesn't help matters. I'd also like to refer you to her conversation with Shepard about the original beacon and how there's a very good chance that most people would have been driven insane by contact with it. Shepard, as a strong willed invididual, is an exception. I also think someone jokingly put out the suggestion that we don't know how the Prothean beacons functioned. They could easily have been the Prothean version of a horror movie.

Her arguements are not sufficient evidence in and of themselves, but they are still evidence. Many scholars have been dismissed throughout history, only later to be proven right. People have been convinced others or wrong or suddenly started believing others are right, even on flimsy evidence. It happens all the time. In this case, the evidence is even genuine.

So it's an argument to potentiality? 'Reapers could exist, the Council is not omniscient, so they should accept the Reapers as real'? Shepard is the only one with access to the warning. No one else! And 'wiped out' is a loaded word. No prothean expert, Liara included, had been able to unearth where the Protheans went, so 'mysteriously disappeared' is all we can conclude.

Yes, the Council 'doesn't know everything'. No person knows everything. The Rachni offered a completely different scenario. Before the Rachni attack, if someone said 'Rachni exist' we would say they are crazy. I mean, it's like those old cartoons with the dancing frog which plays dead in front of everyone. Until you see it dance, you have no reason to assume it's anything other than dead.  

You were saying it is implausable. The concept that Sovereign was an AI of a previously unencountered species is no more implausable than Space bugs nearly driving the Asari and Salarians to extinction. It isn't like the dancing frog because it is an event that they have already witnessed before, albiet with a different race (the Rachni). If there were known species of animal capable of spontaneous dancing, then the dancing frog wouldn't be so implausable either.

And actually in that cartoon, everyone the man presents the frog to initially takes him at his word and only rejects him when the frog doesn't dance. Your own example is actually a counter-example.

Keeping in mind that the Council had no problem before rejecting the eye witness testimony of a dockworker about Saren being on Eden Prime. Also keeping in mind that the Council couldn't access Vigil. Shepard: "Listen, my squad can back me up. If you go to Ilos, you'll find all the evidence you'll need from the VI Vigil". Council: "Okay, Shepard, we'll check it out." And nothing pans out.

They discounted the dock worker on the grounds that humanity had obvious potential alterior motives for discrediting or blaming Saren. There were no such motives regarding Vigil. Furthermore on any proper debriefing, the squad members would be debriefed individually and would all have the same story. They could even check their memories via Asari methods. These are actual memories after all, not potential dreams.

Not to mention that Vigil's information (when coming from Shepard) still amounts to more crazy talk. Detailed crazy talk, but crazy nonetheless telling us that the Citadel is a giant relay, the Conduit was a counter-attack to the Reaper threat, etc.

Just like the Rachni. Obviously the veterans of the Rachni war were all insane. Said war never actually happened....

But misled by Saren actually works as a theory! Every direct source of evidence Shepard would like to show (Vigil, Sovereign speaking, to a much lesser extent the beacon) is conveniently unavailable. At this point, they're rolling their eyes and walking away. That's why the Asari Councilor's response is so appropriate: "We believe that you believe it, but that doesn't make it true".

What the BLAZES would be the point of Vigil being set up like that? What point would a reaper hoax serve at that point? It wouldn't make anyone thing Saren should be allowed to succeed...

And was also shut down. Vigil, if active, I concede would have been evidence against the Reapers. But he wasn't active. "Existing in a strange place" is not evidence of Reapers. The reason why the Protheans chose Ilos for research into the Conduit had nothing to do with Reapers. The Conduit's existence had nothing to do with Reapers. It was the smallest amount of luck that the Protheans discovered what happened and teleported themseves to the Citadel.  

Your arguement is that not just shepard, but his entire crew are completely untrustworthy, even though Tali was considered trustworthy enough to present evidence, Garrus is Turian and still with C-Sec, with arguably a grudge against Saren but no plausable reason for giving Saren an excuse such as the Reapers for his actions.

If the entire crew are in some sort of great conspiracy to dupe the council, why are they not in custody? Why is Shepard still a spectre?

It comes down to trust of agents in the field. You seem to be arguing that it is implausable for the Council to actually trust their agents while still letting them act as agents.

[Commander Kurt]

I'm not sure we're supposed to think that no one believes us. To me, at least, it seems more probable that they're going for "we can't tell you" in ME2 (seriously, if you don't trust someone, you say "there's nothing to say, I'm not doing anything", not "I'm doing something but I won't tell you what). We are given clues to this end, maybe the writers are just overestimating the general gamer?



Either way, I'm fine with it. I can work with the Council not believing me for two games, there are rational explanations for not doing so after all. It's better if they do and hide it, but the possibility of them doubting me isn't ruining my experience.

[Moiaussi]

Il Divo wrote...

Pretty important since that's one of the underlying characteristics in what defines a 'Reaper'.

Yes it does. They were attacked by a Geth fleet. Odds on are that Sovereign could easily have been crewed by Geth.

Neither of which matters, really. All that really matters are Sovereign's capabilities and how they would be used. In the hands of a xenophobic races, be they Geth, Reaper, Killer Rabbit or whatever they are a threat.

It is a reasonable course of action to investigate such potential threats.

....Reverse reasoning. What evidence is there that the Protheans are extinct? Answer: No one could locate them until Shepard discovered the Collectors.

Which doesn't change the fact that they are assumed extinct rather than known to be. There may still be Protheans out there (other than the collectors). The migrant fleet (or the battlestar galactica, lol) are examples of how simply 'just keeping going' can result in survival.

That's nice, but Shepard didn't tell them, in Mass Effect 1 or 2, anything close to this. He insists Sovereign was alive. In lieu of a change in position, and in lie of evidence of  observance of this 'shy' crew, that it was crewed by Geth is more than satisfactory.

Why would Shepard have to tell them anything? The council can make such conclusions on their own and not only can, but should think independantly of their agents. There is a lot of room between complete acceptance and complete rejection.

Which has more than a few holes of its own, to be fair.

That is beside the point though. It isn't the only possibiltiy. Also, Shepard was right about everything else, which also was considered far fetched by the council.

Shepard could not prove the existence of other Reaper vessels coming from dark space, he refused to deviate from his story of sentient ships, and died which put an end to the investigation. It doesn't fall to the Council to fill in the pieces of Shepard's theory when he's the one who apparently has all the evidence. "Shepard is crazy, but we'll say it was caused by a race of xenophobic aliens" doesn't cut it when after Virmire he already told them what he thought of the threat.

But Shepard doesn't have to be completely right for it to be a reasonable course of investigation. There is a potential threat out there. Over the course of two years, the Geth still not having any additional ships of sovereign's capabilities, despite their production facilities not being touched should be additional evidence.

If Sovereign was just a ship, why didn't the Geth reverse engineer it? Even if it was just a ship, where did it come from, conveniently in full working order and unmanned? Are there more out there? Is there a base it was found at with additional useful tech? Is there another enemy out there somewhere with additional such ships?

These are all useful questions completely independant of Shepard's raving. Letting Shepard's emotional outbreaks distract from rational analysis is poor leadership at best.