14 réponses à ce sujet

[Dae0]

One thought has been bothering me since seeing that creepy little kid on the citadel regarding the story as it relates to the three games.

In mass effect 1, our whole goal was preventing Soverign, a reaper, from activitating the Citadel, a giant mass relay (and also the home of the <conduit> [sorry, meant catalyst], which is till unknown to us), and thereby faciltating the return of the reaper horde. The protheans prevented direct activation by modifying the keepers, thereby causing them to ignore soverign's signal.

In mass effect 3, we find that the Citadel is really the home of the <conduit> [sorry, meant catalyst], whom controls the reapers.

So, why in the heck didn't the <conduit> [sorry, meant catalyst] just activate the mass relay in ME1 (other than the fact that the game wouldnt have made it to 2 if he/it had)?

It would stand to reason that the <conduit> [sorry, meant catalyst] maintained channels of communication with the reapers at all times, being the arrogant little SOB that he is, meaning that he would have known of Soverign's failure just as Harbinger and the rest of the reapers did?


Sorry about that, I meant catalyst instead of conduit.

Modifié par Dae0, 10 mars 2012 - 09:22 .

[QuirkyGroundhog]

The Catalyst intentionally gives organic life a chance to beat the Cycle and activate the Crucible.

[Verkir]

I'm so confused what exactly the conduit is, in ME1 its the mini relay that is a one way trip from IIlos, in ME2 is the mini relay that even the citadel gardenkeeper (see the krogan fish on the presidium quest in ME) knows about and then in ME3 is the all controlling reaper remote?

Its late but damn i'm confused.

[thavleifrim]

the conduit IS the citadel, perhaps it was no more capable of activating itself than a car starting its engine and coming to pick you up and bring you home without input.

[Mydknightcloud]

You guys must mean the Catalyst. not the Conduit. The catalyst is an AI that controls the reapers. The conduit is a mass effect relay (albeit a small one) the protheans made to serve as a back door to the citadel.

[didymos1120]

QuirkyGroundhog wrote...

The Catalyst intentionally gives organic life a chance to beat the Cycle and activate the Crucible.

If that's what was going on, it should have been mentioned then.  Or at implied at the very least. 

Modifié par didymos1120, 10 mars 2012 - 09:26 .

[Dae0]

QuirkyGroundhog wrote...

The Catalyst intentionally gives organic life a chance to beat the Cycle and activate the Crucible.

To what effect? It said itself that the 3 new options (besides death by reaper) were unknown to it until the crucible was attached. Even after it insists that sentient life cannot be trusted to be self determinant.

[Jonathan Shepard]

Although, Liara at one point does say "conduit" rather than catalyst. I was perplexed, and thought that's what this thread was about.

Yeah, pretty much everything after Anderson's death doesn't make sense.

[Reiella]

Dae0 wrote...

QuirkyGroundhog wrote...

The Catalyst intentionally gives organic life a chance to beat the Cycle and activate the Crucible.

To what effect? It said itself that the 3 new options (besides death by reaper) were unknown to it until the crucible was attached. Even after it insists that sentient life cannot be trusted to be self determinant.

However, the Catalyst [and the Reapers by extension] do not destroy all sentient life.  They destroy all galactic civilizations during each cycle.  The goal is to let sentient life have an opportunity to exist and develop.  When they approach the "point of no return" [from their perspective, wrt to the AI development], they end their civilization and catalog their civilization into a Reaper.

As to why the Catalyst couldn't just go "Hey guys, time to PEW PEW" itself instead of requiring Sovereign, I dunno.  Perhaps the Catalyst was asleep until it recieved the signal, and when the Reapers took the Citadel, they obviously were able to 'connect' like Sovereign attempted to.  Or maybe a Keeper did it!

[Lyrandori]

QuirkyGroundhog wrote...

The Catalyst intentionally gives organic life a chance to beat the Cycle and activate the Crucible.

So why is Sovereign trying to acitvate it then?

If it controls the Reapers, it means it controls Sovereign. If the intention is to give the cycle a chance then why is Sovereign trying his best at preventing that very chance to even occur to start with?

[Rawgrim]

This is what happens when EA replaces all the writers from the first game, with brand new ones halfway through ME2.

[lasertank]

No. It makes no sense. It's ill-contrived and cheap. The dark ending is fine, but it comes with no reason and logic. For example, why is Shepard's DNA required for the synthesis? If it's an ultimate solution why had not it been done before? How could Shepard believe in the Catalyst so easily in less than 1 minute? They are all seriously flawed plots made for one purpose: Earn your money.

[Adain878]

A wizard did it

[AtreiyaN7]

The Conduit was a back door that the Protheans managed to create to allow access to the Citadel. It was a wild card in my opinion, and no, it's not the same as the Catalyst (the AI or whatever it is that apparently resides within the Citadel proper). From the ME wiki:

However, the damaged VI on Ilos, Vigil, fills in the gaps. The Conduit is a miniature mass relay which the Prothean researchers on Ilos built as a prototype during their experiments into mass relay technology. It is essentially a 'back door' onto the Citadel, which is the hub of the relay network.

As for the other issue: I don't think it really needed a sit-down explanation. It seemed fairly clear to me from the information about the nature of the "plans" for the Crucible that one could infer that it was something that was intended.

Each cycle produced a civilization that took the Crucible further but they all failed to finish the Crucible until this cycle. It was only now that we finally had someone with the tenacity and will, Shepard, to bring unity, co-operation, and organization to all the races, along wtih attracting synthetic allies like the geth  (depending on what you do). In the previous cycle, the Protheans certainly came closest, but in my opinion, their empire utlimately failed because they didn't treat others as equals and believed in domination over co-operation. Think about all the races that they destroyed or made subservient that could, conceivably, have helped.

Also, I'm surprised that no one's pointing out the meaning behind the name of the Crucible itself: a crucible is a test of character, and if you think about it, the whole series was a trial/test for Shepard that forged him/her into the one person who might be able to save us all. In the end, it was his/her strength of character shaped by his/her experiences that brought everyone together and made it possible to break the cycle. Secondarily, a crucible can also be used in purifying metals in which impurities are stripped away. I think the naming of the "weapon" was not chosen without reason.

Modifié par AtreiyaN7, 10 mars 2012 - 10:23 .

[Reiella]

AtreiyaN7 wrote...

Each cycle produced a civilization that took the Crucible further but they all failed to finish the Crucible until this cycle. It was only now that we finally had someone with the tenacity and will, Shepard, to bring unity, co-operation, and organization to all the races, along wtih attracting synthetic allies like the geth  (depending on what you do). In the previous cycle, the Protheans certainly came closest, but in my opinion, their empire utlimately failed because they didn't treat others as equals and believed in domination over co-operation. Think about all the races that they destroyed or made subservient that could, conceivably, have helped.

Also, I'm surprised that no one's pointing out the meaning behind the name of the Crucible itself: a crucible is a test of character, and if you think about it, the whole series was a trial/test for Shepard that forged him/her into the one person who might be able to save us all. In the end, it was his/her strength of character shaped by his/her experiences that brought everyone together and made it possible to break the cycle. Secondarily, a crucible can also be used in purifying metals in which impurities are stripped away. I think the naming of the "weapon" was not chosen without reason.

We also had very good luck in the Protheans succeeded at stopping the ROFLStomp at the Citadel for this cycle, which did buy us more time.  Even though no one really believed Shepard anyway, but at least Earth found the data and was able to build it in the 'early stages of war' instead of during the Clean-Up operations in the ~100 year cycle.