301 réponses à ce sujet

[WizenSlinky0]

KenKenpachi wrote...

Lol I have only one..." skills to succede" lol wtf is that? You sound like a ****ing school counsoler.

As to your "Use someone else" repeat line...no. Most spectures from what we've seen work alone, and do wetwork.

You
want people who are ruthless, skilled, trained, and have no problems
with killing and being alone. So if the crap blows up in one's face,
well its that many less that know that you had your hand in the cookie
jar, and thus that less to have...."accidents" to happen too.


Also
to the above....some what true. However a high ranking intell anaylist
never has his ass in the bush short of on TV and movies.

Saren used mercenries before using the geth. Shepard uses his squad. Visir or whatever her name was used Shadowbroker troops.

They do not work alone unless they *want* to work alone. Which they can. It's the point of a spectre to decide how they want to complete an objective

Ship.wreck wrote...

Furthermore,
I bet he was an expert in the operation of those drones: combat. And
even if that weren't the case: Inelligence anylists are not operatives.
If they were, they would be called intelligence operatives. I don't deny
that he was elite military something.

Now they guy placing the
wire taps, he would be an operative, and he would need to know how to
handle himself if placing of said tap went poorly.

 op-er-a-tive –noun 1. a person engaged, employed, or skilled in some branch of work, especially productive or industrial work; worker. 2. a detective. 3. a secret agent; spy.
Operative has nothing to do with "combat" specifically.

Modifié par WizenSlinky0, 15 mai 2011 - 10:34 .

[CulturalGeekGirl]

Ship.wreck wrote...

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...
I disagree.

As I said before, I had a friend who was classified as an "elite military operative" at least in some respects. He was an intelligence analyst, and very rarely left the shelter of his compound, though he did things like piloting drones and monitoring wiretaps.

He went through basic training, but was hardly a combat expert.

In the future of Mass Effect they have even more technological non-combat ways to do things, so typical combat would be far less important than it is today. You're being very human-centric in assuming that all militaries of all the different races have the exact same emphasis on firearms combat as their primary training focus.

You cannot deny the wisdom of the Tupac.

Furthermore, I bet he was an expert in the operation of those drones: combat. And even if that weren't the case: Inelligence anylists are not operatives. If they were, they would be called intelligence operatives. I don't deny that he was elite military something.

Now they guy placing the wire taps, he would be an operative, and he would need to know how to handle himself if placing of said tap went poorly.

I don't assume everyone trains the same way. I just assume that everyone trains heavily, at some point, in some way, in the use of firearms. Even the Salarian infiltration team on Virmire(?) was heavily armed and armored, and they supposedly place much higher emphasis on intelligence. But the fact remains, you just don't send a team that small to recon an enemy force that large, equip them that well, and NOT give them advanced training in the use of firearms.

I know alot of people in this forum are the happy go lucky care bear type, but without the capacity to enforce one's will through the use of force there just is no substance to a military operation. Without violance a military operation is just a hollow "exercise" without a real world result.

First: one point of order - the idea that a Spectre would need some very basic combat skills had been agreed upon, the question we're debating now is this: what portion of a Spectre's skillset would have to be combat-oriented, and is it possible to be combat-oriented without heavy use of conventional guns?

In regads to your quote about violence, you definitely don't know anything about the Salarian military based on that statement. From the Salarian military's perspective, the best way to defeat a military oponent is by using additives poison their entire planet's water supply with drugs that make the race docile and sleepy, a month before the enemy's attack would be launched. This would mean that absolutely no conventional "violence" would be used on either side. I'm not saying that the Salarians can avoid violence all the time, but I am saying that their military focuses on unconventional solutions, like sabotage and the genophage.

The operative needed to carry out such an operation succesfully might need to be 90:10 Science:Combat skills. Or 40:55:5 Science:Stealth:Combat. The point is that if they were discovered, whether or not they were able to fight would not be as important as their ability to escape or destroy the evidence. Someone can be very good at stealth without an emphasis on firearms or hand-to-hand-combat.

In my real world example, the drones were mainly for surveilance, (I think). I don't consider remote surveilance a combat skill, typically. But again, as I said, he had been through basic training, which might be enough "combat experience" for some people here.

I guess what I'm asking is this: what is the minimum percentage of combat oriented skills you think a spectre needs to have? Can they be 30% Science, 30% Tech, 25% Stealth, 10% diplomacy, and only 5% combat?

[Ship.wreck_]

General User wrote...

Dean, this is a really good thread, it challenges my preconceptions.

I don’t think the Council is going for scary so much as intimidating when it comes to SPECTREs. And there is little more intimidating than sitting down across the negotiating table with someone you know is out of your league.

The terms scary and intimidating are almost, if not actually, synonymous. And yeah, alot is more intimidating than knowing you're about to be out-negotiated. Knowing that you're about to get punched in the face, for example, is alot more intimidating than knowing you're about to get out negotiated. Let alone stabbed shot and or biotically crushed.

But again I have to point out, there's simply nothing spectre-like about negotiation or diplomacy. Not the position Spectre, just the word spectre. It doesn't make sense, even if you were trying to intimidate someone with your negotiating prowess the term just doesn't aply to the nature of what you do.

Furthermore (which I love to say), as I mentioned earlier, the threat of force is much more intimidating than the prospect of loosing an officious argument or "negotiation". And if any bad guy was faced with the "threat" of a negotiation he knew he would not come out on top of, he'd just resort to that force. Force is an operative term here, the place of the Spectre is to enforce the will of the Counil. Things can't be enforced, without foce. A Spectre without the badassery and expertise to destroy if necessary would be like a lawer who can convict you, but there's no police to arrest and imprison you. "Whoopdy-do, I'm convicted. I'm gonna go home now."
"No, you have to take yourself to jail because you're convicted!"
"Oh yeah? Make me."

Except when it isn’t. Carrots and sticks, so to speak.

What?

True enough, but there are two sides to that coin. Think of it this way; a non-combat SPECTRE would be a glorified desk-jockey in the same way a combat SPECTRE would be a glorified grunt. 

True, but a glorified grunt can still kick your ass. All a glorified desk jockey could do is wave a policy or a document or a pen at you and say, "But you better..."

Except when they do. Saren had a geth army, Tela Vasir had Shadow Broker mercs, Shepard has his own hand-picked team of specialists.  Even Nihlus had an Alliance frigate and Marine ground team on hnad during Eden Prime.

Yeah, about that Geth army... Saren wasn't supposed to have one. Haha! Didn't play the dlc's. Nihlus was a visitor to the SR1 (which was an Alliance Navy Frigate ). It wasn't his frigate or his crew, when that one time job got done, he was gonna be back on his own.

Granted though, any Spectre going into a fight, or going into anywhere where there might be a fight, is going to bring along a crew. But if you're putting yourself in a position where there might be a fight, and you are if you're a Spectre, you don't do so under the circumstances that you have only basic training, and HOPE that your elite team members will be able to save your ass. You're the one making contact with the potential hostiles if you're TRYING to negotiate, if a fight breaks out, it's going to do so directly into your face. So you damn well better be an expert at handling yourself in order to get out of there. Otherwise the result will just be, you get shot in your face and IF your team wins they can return your body to the citadel.

The idea behind being a top-level negotiator is that you don't get yourself into that situation often, if ever.  The idea behind being a negotiator SPECTRE is that, even if negotiations do break down, you have the skills and means to get others to be your muscle for you.

See above. Having someone near you who does know how to fight isn't good enough to make up for your NOT knowing how to fight.

Ship.wreck wrote...
And if someone decides to kill you for any reason, yeah, you're screwed.

umm... yes?

Therefore it would behoove, most likely be REQUIRED of, a Spectre to be able to (if nothing else) protect himself through the expert use of force.

Comparing SPECTREs to any sort of special forces is, at the very least, problematic. The two differ greatly in terms of what kinds of assignments they are given (SPECTREs are often given broad goals vice specific missions), and much more importantly how they are expected to complete them. Namely SPECTREs aren’t expected to complete their assignments in any particular way.

No it's not. The codex says they're elite military operatives, that IS special forces. Ah yes, I see the vast difference in duties of Spectres vs. SEALS perfectly demonstrated in that Shepard was assigned to seek out and destroy Saren in the un-policed and dangerous Terminus Systems (or something like that) while the SEALS are given much different assignments like seek out and destroy Osama Bin Laden in the unpoliced and dangerous Pakistani tribal regions... Oh wait

Modifié par Ship.wreck , 15 mai 2011 - 11:10 .

[Gabey5]

yes they need to be gunboys

[Ship.wreck_]

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...
First: one point of order - the idea that a Spectre would need some very basic combat skills had been agreed upon, the question we're debating now is this: what portion of a Spectre's skillset would have to be combat-oriented, and is it possible to be combat-oriented without heavy use of conventional guns?

I know. With biotics one could be combat oriented without the use of firearms, but nobody's so uber biotic that they don't bother to carry a gun. And from an ME perspective even an Adept (or whatever) would be highly trained in the use of whatever weapons they specialize in. Everyone uses a gun, and everyone needs to be able to use it very well.

In regads to your quote about violence, you definitely don't know anything about the Salarian military based on that statement. From the Salarian military's perspective, the best way to defeat a military oponent is by using additives poison their entire planet's water supply with drugs that make the race docile and sleepy, a month before the enemy's attack would be launched. This would mean that absolutely no conventional "violence" would be used on either side. I'm not saying that the Salarians can avoid violence all the time, but I am saying that their military focuses on unconventional solutions, like sabotage and the genophage.

Ah yes, poison them a month before their attack without knowing when their attack is supposed to be because you didn't gather intel. Or bio-engineer a genophage without knowing anything about their genome because you didn't gather intel. Oh wait no, doing any of the examples you posed would require HEAVY reliance on intelligence. Kinda like how I said, they place emphasis on gathering intel. As for gathering intel, that requires extensive field work. As for field work, you can send intel OPERATIVES in without extensive combat training... just don't expect to get them or anything they learned back from it.

The operative needed to carry out such an operation succesfully might need to be 90:10 Science:Combat skills. Or 40:55:5 Science:Stealth:Combat. The point is that if they were discovered, whether or not they were able to fight would not be as important as their ability to escape or destroy the evidence. Someone can be very good at stealth without an emphasis on firearms or hand-to-hand-combat.

The people needed to conduct such an operation would need to be scientists 100/0 science/combat skills, pilots 95/0/5 flight/science/combat skills and OPERATIVES I don't know 80/20 combat/other necessary skills for a given operation.

Bottom line is this: Wherever trouble is in the Galaxy, that's where Spectre's are going. And they're not going to fare so well in those places if they don't know how to handle themselves very well when negotiations fail and diplomacy breaks down. Which by the way, is the only time you would need a Spectre in the first place. If negotiations and diplomacy had a high probability of success, you'd just send a friggin ambassador, that's what those guys are for.

In my real world example, the drones were mainly for surveilance, (I think). I don't consider remote surveilance a combat skill, typically. But again, as I said, he had been through basic training, which might be enough "combat experience" for some people here.

Like I said, even if the drones weren't for combat: Analysts aren't operatives. That's why their called intelligence analysts instead of intelligence operatives. Again, not denying that he was elite at whatever he did.

I guess what I'm asking is this: what is the minimum percentage of combat oriented skills you think a spectre needs to have? Can they be 30% Science, 30% Tech, 25% Stealth, 10% diplomacy, and only 5% combat?

I don't know. Skills aren't numerically quatifiable like that, the "human" element's a b*tch when trying to analyze an idividual on paper with percentages. Ultimately, if you needed someone to do science and combat on an elite Spectre level, they would need to be much better at BOTH that most others. And thus combat experts, and science experts, or stealth expert whatever is necessary for the task at hand. BTW 5% combat isn't good enough at combat to survive any combat so why bother?

Modifié par Ship.wreck , 15 mai 2011 - 11:07 .

[Dean_the_Young]

Ship.wreck wrote...

True, but a glorified grunt can still kick your ass. All a glorified desk jockey could do is wave a policy or a document or a pen at you and say, "But you better..."

Or they could 'accidentally' put your name on the terrorist watch list, freeze all your money on child pornography charges, and retarget a cruise missile to kill your mother.

Before tasking the CIA/GRU/M6 to poison your food. With laxitives. And then car bomb the entire building while you're on the ****ter.

And that's just against the average law-abiding citizen without much to lose. The more you have, the more the government can take away.


Have you even considered what an unchecked beuracracy can do to you, your life, and the lives of anyone connected to you? Is the concept of the abusive powers a police state, even beyond physical violence, really that foreign to you.

Most coercive power doesn't even come from direct physical violence. We're civilized socieites: we have all manners of non-violent ways to **** with people. And then kill them indirectly.

Modifié par Dean_the_Young, 15 mai 2011 - 11:19 .

[z4t001]

didnt they say saren was so good at being a spectre before because he was ruthless and resourceful? to me that means he had a lot of power outside of just being a bad ass.

keep in mind he was also quite powerful in combat. shepard would never stand a chance against saren 1v1, especially if he had his little green goblin air scooter thing. makes you wonder why sovereign decided to turn him into a robo zombie instead of just bringing him back like he was..

[Ship.wreck_]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

Ship.wreck wrote...

True, but a glorified grunt can still kick your ass. All a glorified desk jockey could do is wave a policy or a document or a pen at you and say, "But you better..."

Or they could 'accidentally' put your name on the terrorist watch list, freeze all your money on child pornography charges, and retarget a cruise missile to kill your mother.

Before tasking the CIA/GRU/M6 to poison your food. With laxitives. And then car bomb the entire building while you're on the ****ter.


Have you even considered what an unchecked beuracracy can do to you, your life, and the lives of anyone connected to you? Is the concept of the abusive powers a police state, even beyond physical violence, really that foreign to you.

Most coercive power doesn't even come from direct physical violence. We're civilized socieites: we have all manners of non-violent ways to **** with people. And then kill them indirectly.

Car bombing someone would be DIRECTLY killing them. All that stuff you just said is based on a highly integrated system lots of people working together. In the case you just cited our negotiator specter has a massive support base. Spectre's don't necessarily. Saren had one, his was completely illigitimate. All Shepard has ever had is an SR and a small crew. For example*

Council, "Saren's out there being evil, go get him."
Shepard, "Uhhhh... ok. Send a fleet to help me, go get him."
Council, "No."

*Paraphrased

Point is, without the ability to execute force in some way, everything else is useless.
Yours was, get someone else to execute force
Shepard doesn't have anyone else to do his job for him.

Not to mention none of that beurocracy would work, if you got f#$%in' killed before you could accidently put anything on anything. Which would be the case if you're a Spectre who can't stop them from killing you, yourself throught the expert use of force. You go in to negotiate, and they don't like how it's going, you're not coming out AT ALL. Let alone coming out, going back to the citadel and sicing some other citadel dogs on the guys. In fact you ARE the citadel dog that's been sic'd on the badguys, by the citadel. YOU'RE supposed to handle the problem, not negotiate at it, come back tail tucked between your legs, and call someone else to handle it for you.

And as we've seen the vast majority of Spectre level problems don't get handled without force.

not to mention AGAIN

There's just nothing spectre like about negotiating, so you would never assign a negotiator the title Spectre! spectre's kill you, they don't negotiate you and likewise Spectres kill you, they don't negotiate you.

[Ship.wreck_]

@Dean

Basically the point is how could you:

'accidentally' put someone's name on the terrorist watch list, freeze all their money on child pornography charges, and retarget a cruise missile to kill their mother.

Before tasking the CIA/GRU/M6 to poison their food. With laxitives. And then car bomb the entire building while they're on the ****ter...

If you're already fing DEAD because you went and tried to negotiate with Saren or a Reaper or some rogue mercenaries, or the Batarians or anyone? They'd just fing kill you. And if you can't kill them better faster first, you can't do anything else even if you did have that kind of support. Which we've clearly seen, Spectre's do NOT. The council doesn't even want to know WHAT they're doing, let alone dispatch any legit support to help them do it.

[Dean_the_Young]

Ship.wreck wrote...


Car bombing someone would be DIRECTLY killing them. All that stuff you just said is based on a highly integrated system lots of people working together. In the case you just cited our negotiator specter has a massive support base. Spectre's don't necessarily. Saren had one, his was completely illigitimate. All Shepard has ever had is an SR and a small crew. For example*

From the relation of the beuracrat who ordered it, or the person who armed it? No, it's still an indirect means of killing. Direct is linear line-to-sight from user to target.

Spectres can have as much of a support base as they want. Saren's mercs were legitimate. Vasir's Shadow Broker was legitimate. Shepard's combat team, provided ship and crew, and even AI was legit, not to mention the entire state-aparatus that went behind Shepard.

Council, "Saren's out there being evil, go get him."
Shepard, "Uhhhh... ok. Send a fleet to help me, go get him."
Council, "No."

*Paraphrased

[/and then the Alliance threw soldiers, intel, logistics, and diplomatic support]

Not to mention none of that beurocracy would work, if you got f#$%in' killed before you could accidently put anything on anything. Which would be the case if you're a Spectre who can't stop them from killing you, yourself throught the expert use of force. You go in to negotiate, and they don't like how it's going, you're not coming out AT ALL. Let alone coming out, going back to the citadel and sicing some other citadel dogs on the guys. In fact you ARE the citadel dog that's been sic'd on the badguys, by the citadel. YOU'RE supposed to handle the problem, not negotiate at it, come back tail tucked between your legs, and call someone else to handle it for you.

And being a kickass commando doesn't prevent you from choking in space like a **** Shepard did, or death by snusnu from Morinth like some idiots did Shepard can. Nor can Shepard be counted to always come out on top without a couple dozen reloads.

If you're in a position you're going to die... you're going to die. That's a truism. Your specialty doesn't change that. Your ability to avoid that position does.

And as we've seen the vast majority of Spectre level problems don't get handled without force.

Since when is four Spectres, two of whome we saw for less than thirty minutes, a vast majority of Spectres?


Lets look at various Spectre problems, and then we can look at why a commando team is the only solution for a Spectres (as opposed to, say, police commandoes themselves).

There's just nothing spectre like about negotiating, so you would never assign a negotiator the title Spectre! spectre's kill you, they don't negotiate you and likewise Spectres kill you, they don't negotiate you.

Uh, yes there is: diplomacy is called the persuade option. Sometimes Shepard's smart enough/able enough to find other means as well.

[Dean_the_Young]

Ship.wreck wrote...

@Dean

Basically the point is how could you:

'accidentally' put someone's name on the terrorist watch list, freeze all their money on child pornography charges, and retarget a cruise missile to kill their mother.

Before tasking the CIA/GRU/M6 to poison their food. With laxitives. And then car bomb the entire building while they're on the ****ter...

If you're already fing DEAD because you went and tried to negotiate with Saren or a Reaper or some rogue mercenaries, or the Batarians or anyone? They'd just fing kill you. And if you can't kill them better faster first, you can't do anything else even if you did have that kind of support. Which we've clearly seen, Spectre's do NOT. The council doesn't even want to know WHAT they're doing, let alone dispatch any legit support to help them do it.

How do any undercover operatives survive? By avoiding that situation and shaping the ones they have to meet.

If you're already presuming the person is dead from the start, what about Shepard being spaced? Or poisoned? Or death by snusnu? Or going out into the open without cover?

A successful Spectre wouldn't let themselves be put into a position where the fast draw would stop them. So when they need to negotiate, they do so from a position at which the other person can't simply shoot them from across the table. When they sneak in, they make sure the guards are distracted and absent.


The Council knows what the Spectres are being aimed at. That's, you know, their point of the Spectres. How much support the Spectres have is defined by politics (how much the Council/the source race wants to provide) and the Spectre's inclination (how much they want a team).

No Spectre has ever been forced to work solo for Spectre missions, or been denied support that they can otherwise get from anywhere but the Council.

[General User]

Ship.wreck wrote...
The terms scary and intimidating are almost, if not actually, synonymous.

Horse shoes and hand grenades, as they say.

Ship.wreck wrote...
And yeah, alot is more intimidating than knowing you're about to be out-negotiated. Knowing that you're about to get punched in the face, for example, is alot more intimidating than knowing you're about to get out negotiated. Let alone stabbed shot and or biotically crushed.

But again I have to point out, there's simply nothing spectre-like about negotiation or diplomacy. Not the position Spectre, just the word spectre. It doesn't make sense, even if you were trying to intimidate someone with your negotiating prowess the term just doesn't aply to the nature of what you do.

Furthermore (which I love to say), as I mentioned earlier, the threat of force is much more intimidating than the prospect of loosing an officious argument or "negotiation". And if any bad guy was faced with the "threat" of a negotiation he knew he would not come out on top of, he'd just resort to that force. Force is an operative term here, the place of the Spectre is to enforce the will of the Counil. Things can't be enforced, without foce. A Spectre without the badassery and expertise to destroy if necessary would be like a lawer who can convict you, but there's no police to arrest and imprison you. "Whoopdy-do, I'm convicted. I'm gonna go home now."
"No, you have to take yourself to jail because you're convicted!"
"Oh yeah? Make me."

There are ways to motivate people besides the threat or use of force, ways that are often more effective.  The threat and use of force may be behind many/most of the acts of the State, but that doesn't mean it's the most important part. 

To stick with your own example. It’s a lawyer, a district attorney (or Crown Prosecutor, cheers Dave666), who is the principal person behind sending a criminal to jail. The police work for her to help her make her case. 

Ship.wreck wrote...
Yeah, about that Geth army... Saren wasn't supposed to have one. Haha! Didn't play the dlc's. Nihlus was a visitor to the SR1 (which was an Alliance Navy Frigate ). It wasn't his frigate or his crew, when that one time job got done, he was gonna be back on his own.

But Saren did have that army. And before that he used mercenaries.  I’m not sure what your point about Nihlus even is.  Part of the Normandy’s mission at Eden Prime was to back up Nihlus, so what? 

My point is that; while different SPECTREs have different styles, all the ones we’ve seen have had fairly substantial backup. And there’s no reason some other SPECTRE couldn’t go ‘whole hog’ and sit out of the fighting entirely.  

Ship.wreck wrote...
Granted though, any Spectre going into a fight, or going into anywhere where there might be a fight, is going to bring along a crew. But if you're putting yourself in a position where there might be a fight, and you are if you're a Spectre, you don't do so under the circumstances that you have only basic training, and HOPE that your elite team members will be able to save your ass. You're the one making contact with the potential hostiles if you're TRYING to negotiate, if a fight breaks out, it's going to do so directly into your face. So you damn well better be an expert at handling yourself in order to get out of there. Otherwise the result will just be, you get shot in your face and IF your team wins they can return your body to the citadel.

Having someone near you who does know how to fight isn't good enough to make up for your NOT knowing how to fight.

Therefore it would behoove, most likely be REQUIRED of, a Spectre to be able to (if nothing else) protect himself through the expert use of force.

SPECTREs are direct agents of the Council tasked with solving problems other's can't.  Nothing about that necessitates that a SPECTRE be in harm’s way at all. 

Ship.wreck wrote...
No it's not. The codex says they're elite military operatives, that IS special forces. Ah yes, I see the vast difference in duties of Spectres vs. SEALS perfectly demonstrated in that Shepard was assigned to seek out and destroy Saren in the un-policed and dangerous Terminus Systems (or something like that) while the SEALS are given much different assignments like seek out and destroy Osama Bin Laden in the unpoliced and dangerous Pakistani tribal regions... Oh wait

SPECTREs differ from modern military special forces in three key ways:

First, they differ greatly in terms of what kinds of assignments they are given (SPECTREs are often given broad goals vice specific missions).

Second, SPECTREs aren’t expected to complete their assignments in any particular way.

Third, SPECTREs are accountable to the Council only and the Council directly. There is no chain of command for them to follow.  No body of law, civil or military, under which they might be tried.

[CulturalGeekGirl]

Ship.wreck wrote...

CulturalGeekGirl wrote...
First: one point of order - the idea that a Spectre would need some very basic combat skills had been agreed upon, the question we're debating now is this: what portion of a Spectre's skillset would have to be combat-oriented, and is it possible to be combat-oriented without heavy use of conventional guns?

I know. With biotics one could be combat oriented without the use of firearms, but nobody's so uber biotic that they don't bother to carry a gun. And from an ME perspective even an Adept (or whatever) would be highly trained in the use of whatever weapons they specialize in. Everyone uses a gun, and everyone needs to be able to use it very well.

Ah yes, poison them a month before their attack without knowing when their attack is supposed to be because you didn't gather intel. Or bio-engineer a genophage without knowing anything about their genome because you didn't gather intel. Oh wait no, doing any of the examples you posed would require HEAVY reliance on intelligence. Kinda like how I said, they place emphasis on gathering intel. As for gathering intel, that requires extensive field work. As for field work, you can send intel OPERATIVES in without extensive combat training... just don't expect to get them or anything they learned back from it.

Your premise is based on the idea that the only way to effectively gather intelligence is to put feet on the ground. I think that premise is inherently flawed, and mired in the present rather than the future. You're not thinking with Portals.

If your combat operatives are attacked you've already basically lost the element of surprise. Tiny, dragonfly-sized, non-combat flying camera robots are something that we can almost do TODAY. I guarantee the Salarians have them, and that they can be piloted and collected without a single "combat operative" ever stepping foot on the planet.

If you think that intelligence relies on dudes with guns tromping around a planet killing anyone who catches them, you're not thinking like the FUTURE. I guarantee you that my football-sized stealth mini-dropship containing 500 tiny dragonfly sample collectors, that will land and release the bots (self destructing if uncovered before the bots release) is a million times more effective than a full-sized humanoid tramping around an enemy planet. Why would you need a humanoid on-planet? Your chances for detection go up a billion times, and your actual information collecting abilities are barely affected, unless you're fighting your own species and can effectively infiltrate an organization.

Ship.wreck wrote...

The operative needed to carry out such an operation succesfully might need to be 90:10 Science:Combat skills. Or 40:55:5 Science:Stealth:Combat. The point is that if they were discovered, whether or not they were able to fight would not be as important as their ability to escape or destroy the evidence. Someone can be very good at stealth without an emphasis on firearms or hand-to-hand-combat.

The people needed to conduct such an operation would need to be scientists 100/0 science/combat skills, pilots 95/0/5 flight/science/combat skills and OPERATIVES I don't know 80/20 combat/other necessary skills for a given operation.

Bottom line is this: Wherever trouble is in the Galaxy, that's where Spectre's are going. And they're not going to fare so well in those places if they don't know how to handle themselves very well when negotiations fail and diplomacy breaks down. Which by the way, is the only time you would need a Spectre in the first place. If negotiations and diplomacy had a high probability of success, you'd just send a friggin ambassador, that's what those guys are for.

You seem to be conflating Stealth with Combat. I believe those skills are completely and utterly separate. They're often used at the same time, but someone can be taught not to be detected without learning how to fire a gun, and someone can be taught how to fire a gun and seventeen kinds of hand-to-hand combat without knowing anything about stealth.

I'd argue that the operatives in this scenario would at the very least have to be 90/10 Stealth/combat. The more points you can put into stealth the better. If you are discovered, and the enemy even has enough time to put through a radio call saying "Salarian spotted on planet" then you have lost a vital advantage. If a bunch of people go missing and the enemy gets suspicious, you've also failed. The stealth aspect is so much more important than the combat aspect, it's crazy.

Ship.wreck wrote...

I guess what I'm asking is this: what is the minimum percentage of combat oriented skills you think a spectre needs to have? Can they be 30% Science, 30% Tech, 25% Stealth, 10% diplomacy, and only 5% combat?

I don't know. Skills aren't numerically quatifiable like that, the "human" element's a b*tch when trying to analyze an idividual on paper with percentages. Ultimately, if you needed someone to do science and combat on an elite Spectre level, they would need to be much better at BOTH that most others. And thus combat experts, and science experts, or stealth expert whatever is necessary for the task at hand. BTW 5% combat isn't good enough at combat to survive any combat so why bother?

I'd disagree with that premise. Also, I'll explain my "percentages" example. Ok.

Let's say I've spent the last 19 years of my life studying stealth and thievery, though I have never once harmed anyone or gotten into a combat situation. This means I've so far devoted 100% of my life to building up my stealth skills.

Now let's say I'm tapped for a new spy program. They give me a year-long crash course in combat and survival. Now I have 19 years of stealth/thievery training and 1 year of combat training. Now I have that effective 95% stealth, 5% combat ratio I keep talking about. I still think there are a great number of Spectre-related tasks I'd be better suited for than some gun-jockey with a single year of stealth training, or even someone who has 10 years of stealth training and 10 years of combat training. Because this mission is more focused on stealth, and someone who isn't quite as good at stealth as I am will fail it. They need someone who has devoted a much larger portion of their life to studying stealth rather than combat, and that's what I offer.

The same thing is true for other skills than stealth, but that seemed to be the example people would be able to understand.

[DxWill10]

But... are there any spectres in the ME universe who are incapable of proficient combat? Me thinks no

[Dean_the_Young]

DxWill10 wrote...

But... are there any spectres in the ME universe who are incapable of proficient combat? Me thinks no

Shepard in the hands of a bad player.

[Dave666]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

DxWill10 wrote...

But... are there any spectres in the ME universe who are incapable of proficient combat? Me thinks no

Shepard in the hands of a bad player.

That made me laugh Dean, I just had an image of someone playing all the way through ME:1 Insanity without upgrading weapons/armour and never placing skill points.  Can you imagine how often they'd die? 

[Dean_the_Young]

Dave666 wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...

DxWill10 wrote...

But... are there any spectres in the ME universe who are incapable of proficient combat? Me thinks no

Shepard in the hands of a bad player.

That made me laugh Dean, I just had an image of someone playing all the way through ME:1 Insanity without upgrading weapons/armour and never placing skill points.  Can you imagine how often they'd die? 

It's actually pretty reasonable, and not just on 'lower' difficulties.

I've done missions before (as an engineer) in which I refrained from running or shooting with my Shepard. I pretty much trotted everywhere, touching my omnitool, and controlling my team to do the fighting. Worked surprisingly well as an engineer (combat drones, incinerate, overlord), and even as a Sentinal (assault armor to blast people back, overlord, and warp).


Hell, if you want, just have Shepard walk around with a machine pistol: no ducking, no running, just walking, and you can simulate being a Loki mech. Surprisingly plausible strategy with proper teamwork.


Now, of course, since a hypothetical volus spectre would have no reason not to upgrade weapons and tech for both himself and the allies...

Modifié par Dean_the_Young, 16 mai 2011 - 12:54 .

[Ship.wreck_]

Ship.wreck wrote...
There's just nothing spectre like about negotiating, so you would never assign a negotiator the title Spectre! spectre's kill you, they don't negotiate you and likewise Spectres kill you, they don't negotiate you.

Dean_the_Young wrote...
Uh, yes there is: diplomacy is called the persuade option. Sometimes Shepard's smart enough/able enough to find other means as well.

I don't have time to adress everything, I'm gonna go the akums razor route with this one.

Dear lord you're missing the point by a dozen miles. Ok, there's nothing spectre like about negotiators. That doesn't mean the TITLE Spectre (note uppercase "s") that means the origin word spectre.

A spectre is a ghost.

Spectres are titled after the word spectre which means ghost. Why would you name something after a ghost? Because it's ghost-like in that it may be frightening, invulnerable, untraceable, etc. Is there anything spectre-like (not Spectre-like) abot negoitiators? In other words, is there anything ghost-like about negotiators? Answer: No.

There's nothing ghost like about negotiating peacefull sollutions to problems. So why would you ever name a negotiator after the word ghost? And by extension, why would you ever name a negotiator after the word spectre? You wouldn't.

To sum up: Spectres are not non-combatant negotiators because there's nothing spectre-like about non-combatant negotiators.

Spectres are all combat experts. They might specialize in different kinds of combat, and they may or may not prefer non-violent means to their ends; but they are all combat experts.

Modifié par Ship.wreck , 16 mai 2011 - 01:01 .

[Ship.wreck_]

Dean_the_Young wrote...
I've done missions before (as an engineer) in which I refrained from running or shooting with my Shepard. I pretty much trotted everywhere, touching my omnitool, and controlling my team to do the fighting. Worked surprisingly well as an engineer (combat drones, incinerate, overlord), and even as a Sentinal (assault armor to blast people back, overlord, and warp).

Mad props. I don't think games these days allow the player the wiggle room to play as creatively as they want. ME isn't at the top of the list of games where you can figure out your own solutions to problems instead of just shooting everything. But well done.

SOCOM has always been one of my favorites because the customizable weapons, open environments and controllable team members let you handle any given mission many different ways, almost to the extent that you can imagine different options... almost.

Don't know if that remains true for the new one though...

[Dean_the_Young]

Ship.wreck wrote...

Ship.wreck wrote...
There's just nothing spectre like about negotiating, so you would never assign a negotiator the title Spectre! spectre's kill you, they don't negotiate you and likewise Spectres kill you, they don't negotiate you.

Dean_the_Young wrote...
Uh, yes there is: diplomacy is called the persuade option. Sometimes Shepard's smart enough/able enough to find other means as well.

I don't have time to adress everything, I'm gonna go the akums razor route with this one.

Dear lord you're missing the point by a dozen miles. Ok, there's nothing spectre like about negotiators. That doesn't mean the TITLE Spectre (note uppercase "s") that means the origin word spectre.

A spectre is a ghost.

Spectres are titled after the word spectre which means ghost. Why would you name something after a ghost? Because it's ghost-like in that it may be frightening, invulnerable, untraceable, etc. Is there anything spectre-like (not Spectre-like) abot negoitiators? In other words, is there anything ghost-like about negotiators? Answer: No.

There's nothing ghost like about negotiating peacefull sollutions to problems. So why would you ever name a negotiator after the word ghost? And by extension, why would you ever name a negotiator after the word spectre? You wouldn't.

To sum up: Spectres are not non-combatant negotiators because there's nothing spectre-like about non-combatant negotiators.

Spectres are all combat experts. They might specialize in different kinds of combat, and they may or may not prefer non-violent means to their ends; but they are all combat experts.

Arguing by awful, undermined metaphor rather handily subverted by the very codex on the Spectres (including the part of empathetic ambassadors) and including such terrible, invulnerable, untracable characters as Paragon Commander Shepard is more than a bit misguided, not least starting with how not even many variations of Shepard, the one fully known Spectre, meets many of those categories (Paragons aren't particularly frightening, every Shepard is vulnerable to death and being shot dead, Shepard is about as far from untraceable and stealthy as you get.)


Why don't you take your time to construct an argument not betrayed by your own game? And not one that relies on an interpretation of 'stealthy ghost' that Shepard him/herself most certainly doesn't embody?

[Dean_the_Young]

Ship.wreck wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...
I've done missions before (as an engineer) in which I refrained from running or shooting with my Shepard. I pretty much trotted everywhere, touching my omnitool, and controlling my team to do the fighting. Worked surprisingly well as an engineer (combat drones, incinerate, overlord), and even as a Sentinal (assault armor to blast people back, overlord, and warp).

Mad props. I don't think games these days allow the player the wiggle room to play as creatively as they want.

Play Fallout: Vegas, of any Fallout game really, for demonstrations on applications of flexibility.

ME isn't at the top of the list of games where you can figure out your own solutions to problems instead of just shooting everything. But well done.

SOCOM has always been one of my favorites because the customizable weapons, open environments and controllable team members let you handle any given mission many different ways, almost to the extent that you can imagine different options... almost.

Don't know if that remains true for the new one though...

The SOCOM series is pretty generic in that its still a combat-fixated challenge environemnt. It allows flexibility in terms of combat, but not much of anything at all in terms of non-combat solutions.

[Aumata]

Ship.wreck wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...
I've done missions before (as an engineer) in which I refrained from running or shooting with my Shepard. I pretty much trotted everywhere, touching my omnitool, and controlling my team to do the fighting. Worked surprisingly well as an engineer (combat drones, incinerate, overlord), and even as a Sentinal (assault armor to blast people back, overlord, and warp).

Mad props. I don't think games these days allow the player the wiggle room to play as creatively as they want. ME isn't at the top of the list of games where you can figure out your own solutions to problems instead of just shooting everything. But well done.

SOCOM has always been one of my favorites because the customizable weapons, open environments and controllable team members let you handle any given mission many different ways, almost to the extent that you can imagine different options... almost.

Don't know if that remains true for the new one though...

Do not get the new one, it basically sucks.  They made it on railroads instead of being somewhat open fielded.  Not many options compared to the old ones.  Really I have no idea why they tried to make it like any other TPS.

[PrinceLionheart]

They should be able to hold their own, but no, I don't believe they have to be top combat experts. For example, I think Mordin would make a great Spectre, but lore-wise, he's probably the least powerful combat squadmate along with Tali.

Modifié par PrinceLionheart, 16 mai 2011 - 02:27 .

[Ship.wreck_]

Aumata wrote...

Ship.wreck wrote...

Dean_the_Young wrote...
I've done missions before (as an engineer) in which I refrained from running or shooting with my Shepard. I pretty much trotted everywhere, touching my omnitool, and controlling my team to do the fighting. Worked surprisingly well as an engineer (combat drones, incinerate, overlord), and even as a Sentinal (assault armor to blast people back, overlord, and warp).

Mad props. I don't think games these days allow the player the wiggle room to play as creatively as they want. ME isn't at the top of the list of games where you can figure out your own solutions to problems instead of just shooting everything. But well done.

SOCOM has always been one of my favorites because the customizable weapons, open environments and controllable team members let you handle any given mission many different ways, almost to the extent that you can imagine different options... almost.

Don't know if that remains true for the new one though...

Do not get the new one, it basically sucks.  They made it on railroads instead of being somewhat open fielded.  Not many options compared to the old ones.  Really I have no idea why they tried to make it like any other TPS.

NOOOOOOOO!!!!!

I've been fearing that all along! I can't believe they gave up everything that made SOCOM SOCOM in the first place! This sucks so bad. I've been waiting since the last SOCOM for a new SOCOM to come out, it's been like 6 years and when it finally gets here they turn it into just another COD retarded run and gun.

I knew this was going to happen, when I saw the commercials the graphics looked really great, whenever they make an open environment game the graphics are always slightly crapier than the boxed in ones... cause they've got a lot more stuff and space on each level. I knew the graphics were too good to maintain the gameplay standard of the older ones

[Ship.wreck_]

Dean_the_Young wrote...
Arguing by awful, undermined metaphor rather handily subverted by the very codex on the Spectres (including the part of empathetic ambassadors) and including such terrible, invulnerable, untracable characters as Paragon Commander Shepard is more than a bit misguided, not least starting with how not even many variations of Shepard, the one fully known Spectre, meets many of those categories (Paragons aren't particularly frightening, every Shepard is vulnerable to death and being shot dead, Shepard is about as far from untraceable and stealthy as you get.)


Why don't you take your time to construct an argument not betrayed by your own game? And not one that relies on an interpretation of 'stealthy ghost' that Shepard him/herself most certainly doesn't embody?

I'll grant you that Shepard isn't exactly the model of stealth.

But it's a very simple logical premise:

Combatant spectre/ghost-likedness = potential
Non combatant spectre/ghost-likedness = non existent

So if you had a postion that was named for spectre/ghost-likedness "Spectre" those who fill the position would all have to be highly combatant. They can be great negotiators if they want, but they HAVE to be killers, otherwise you wouldn't be calling them Spectres in the first place.

Furthermore Shepards celebrity status is ridiculous and never made any sense in the context of the game itself. Go back and play the first part of ME. The ENTIRE time before you become a Spectre all you EVER hear about is how ultimately bad-ass and secretive the Spectres are.

Oh we can't figure out anywhere Saren's been because he's a Spectre and Spectres are so ridiculously secretive that EVERYTHING they do and EVERYWHERE they go is classified!

As soon as you become a Spectre: everyone know's your name, everyone knows exactly who you are, everyone knows exactly what you're doing, everyone know's exactly where you're going and everyone knows exactly when you got there. And NO ONE even starts to think twice about killing you, even two bit half assed thugs out on desolate rocks hiding from whatever are just like, meh, "kill the spectre" like it's no big deal. WTF???

Anyway, Shepard, Nihilus, Saren etc. might not be particularly ghost like, but they are massively more ghost like than any non-combatant could ever be. You just don't call negotiators spectres, sorry dude, that's not how it works. "Oh my God, look out! It's the ghost-attorney" yeah, no. Doesn't exist. Ghost Recon on the other hand: Sure, why not? Makes perfect sense.

Spectre-negotiator, yeah, no. Doesn't exist. Spectre that crazy special forces dude whos coming to kill you but who's also very smart and not just a dumb rock killer who may CHOOSE to negotiate with you and/or take you alive: Yep.

There are no non-combatant Spectres. Non combatant is absolutely counter to the very idea of calling anyone a spectre.