Smeelia wrote...
The Destiny Ascension was the other Dreadnought in the battle and it holds up reasonably well under fire for some time (and it doesn't have the advantage of limited space for enemies to attack from), it probably takes a comparable amount of time and firepower to destroy (assuming you don't save it) as Sovereign. The ships Sovereign destroys are mostly Frigates (possibly some Cruisers, although those seem to be mostly fighting the Geth) and they also seem to be destroyed quickly in fights with other ships of similar size (the ships destroyed at the start are mostly destroyed by Geth ships in a few shots each and the Geth are fairly quickly destroyed by the ambushing Fifth Fleet forces).
While I'm not saying that the Destiny Ascension was a weak ship by any means, there is a major difference between its situation and Sovereign's besides the limited space that you mentioned. The Destiny Ascension, being the ship that contained the Council was constantly defended by other ships, so there never was a moment where the Geth fleet could focus on it as a single target. Where as during the last phase of the battle at least from what we can see, there were no longer any Geth ship close by to aid Sovereign and almost all the surviving fleet focus fire on it.
Smeelia wrote...
I'm not sure to what extent you can rely on the depiction of the battle in the game since it's played for drama (for example, the shield on Sovereign only dropping when you defeat the Saren husk thing is likely for dramatic reasons rather than directly related) but even so there's not much to suggest Reapers are anything like invulnerable to conventional warfare. They're by no means weak but they seem quite capable of being realistically beaten.
I never said that Sovereign was invulnerable to conventional weapon fire nor did I ever said that Sovereign's shield drop (the reason for associating this with Saren's death is because they happen almost one after the other, too much to be a coincidence) was the sole reason for Sovereign's death. I even agree that Sovereign would have eventually fell with or without shields. All I'm saying is that it took a considerable amount of firepower to do so, and it speaks volumes when we're talking about a single target.
Smeelia wrote...
The numbers of Reapers are definately a potential issue, we don't know exactly how many there are (they don't necessarily have one for every 50,000 years, we know at least some have died) but even a relatively conservative estimate would still give a powerful force.
And also, the Reaper corpse that was dated 37 million years ago was never stated to be the oldest evidence of their existence. So who knows for exactly how much longer they could've been repeating this cycle.
Smeelia wrote...
Even so, tactics would certainly be viable for use against them. They could be led into traps, such as having minefields and so on. They could also be ambushed and attacked with hit and run tactics (a major barrage on their fleet from range and then running away could work, especially if they're staying close together). Assassination/sabotage could work if crews could manage to board a Reaper and place explosives on weak points (or shoot them in the core), this wouldn't be easy but it seems possible.
It wouldn't be easy and obviously the actual number of ships they have and the tactics they use will be a factor but it's not impossible that the Reapers could be fought with what we have now (rather than relying on some new race or technology).
Setting traps and boarding their interior sounds like viable options provided they don't have forces denfending their core like the derelict Reaper (which I'm guessing they probably have) and the whole indoctrination effect while being inside one is also a major deterrent. Hit and run only works when you can outrun or hide from the enemy, which being that most FTL technology are taken from Reapers themselves seems quite unlikely.
It's not impossible, because that would mean zero chance of success. I'm just saying doing it in a way that makes sense without relying on some superpower, superweapon, ancient race etc would be quite hard.
Whatever666343431431654324 wrote...
4) We will not win in a
straight-up battle. There will be some infiltration, based on something
we already know about, that will weaken the Reapers. For example, We
now know much about how Reapers work. We've have sovereign, the dead
reaper, and scans of the Collector base and baby reaper. We understand
much of how indoctrination works. If Indoctrination is a key mechanic to
how a Reaper functions and we can distrupt that then Reapers may become
vulnerable.
The problem with the collector base is that if you choose to keep it, you will always end up giving it to Cerberus, a known human supremacist group. I doubt the other races will be willing to accept their help nor are they willing to share it with non-humans in the first place. But I do agree that ifindoctrination can be disrupted, it will be a major advantage.
Khemical wrote...
No way of defeating the Reapers? I have 2 words "Thannix. Cannon."
Boom goes the dynamite.
Thannix Cannon was a technology developed by reverse engineering from Sovereign's remains. Considering the Reaper's modus operandi being that they allow the other races to take their tech and develop countermeasures based on that fact, I doubt the weapon will work that well against it's own creators than it did against the collector base. Not saying they'll be invulnerable against it, but it would be hard to believe that they have not built any defence against something they made.
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