318 réponses à ce sujet

[The Angry One]

Sgt Stryker wrote...

The Angry One wrote...

The fleet against Sovereign had no Thanix cannons.
And yet once it's barriers were down, the Normandy hulled it with a single torpedo.

Now you tell me if that isn't inconsistent. You cannot run around saying that Sovereign class Reapers are invincible when without their shields they're made of cardboard.

Couple of things about that cutscene:

First, the Normandy wasn't the only ship firing on Sovereign. The rest of the fleet was also pouring fire into it.
Second, maybe that torpedo impact was a critical hit? There's plenty of real-life precedents. I'm especially thinking of the USS Arizona's destruction in the Pearl Harbor attack, where one lucky strike by an aerial bomb landed right in the ship's magazines, setting off a massive explosion inside.

Regardless of whether it was a critical hit, it hulled Sovereign, i.e. it went straight through and out the other side.

[sizuka2]

OP is inarguably correct.

[Sangheili_1337]

Anteocitis wrote...

Red Dust wrote...

So no. We can't beat them conventionally. As stated at least twelve times over the course of the game by Admiral Hackett. 

hackett does indeed say that alot, however the codex and what we are shown directly contraditcs that.

How does the codex and what we are shown contradict that.

[II JazB x]

I think beating the Reapers conventionally would have fitted perfectly with the series and it's themes. The fact that Shepard united the entire galaxy, the first force to threaten the Reapers enough to break the cycle, and having them defeat them through this unity and firepower would fit with the themes of strength through diversity and sacrifice, as thousands of ships would have been destroyed, but the unity of the fleet Shepard gets is enough to take down the reapers,

[Welsh Inferno]

FemmeShep wrote...

Well, I would like to think that each cycle is unique and different. And that in our cycle, it was the first time where entire galaxy rallied together in a concentrated attack. I think it would make the most sense thematically for the series.

But I also don't believe in coming up with plot that doesn't exist. And you are right, if we don't have full knowldege of past cycles, there is sadly, no way to know. Either way, my point still stands. IMO the way the end battle was set up, I did not believe that the Reapers were a guaranteed win against the Galaxy's entire fleet. 

True. I dont believe many even had a chance to unite though. The Citadel trap worked most of the time and we have no evidence to show it didnt any time. In all the tens of thousands of times this has happened though. I would think there would be a cycle where the races are united. 

Just FYI cause I find these races interesting - there is one point from the past that helps you. The Thoi'han and the Inusannon were divided and warred over worlds. Definately shows division among races. They were from about 127,000 years ago. So likely the cycle before the Protheans.

[The Angry One]

As for Thanix cannon range....




Yes I do have too much free time.

[Anteocitis]

Sangheili_1337 wrote...

Anteocitis wrote...

Red Dust wrote...

So no. We can't beat them conventionally. As stated at least twelve times over the course of the game by Admiral Hackett. 

hackett does indeed say that alot, however the codex and what we are shown directly contraditcs that.

How does the codex and what we are shown contradict that.

..because it says, and shows, that we can.

[WilliamDracul88]

What I really didn't understand is where were the 100 megaton nuclear warheads almost-literally RAINING over their squid heads. What kind of stupid weaponry uses the fleet? Why not have 30 nuclear ballistic missile launchers in each side of your vessel, of course directed by VIs?
And the Earth's planetary defense systems? Where are the silos? Where are the 10.000 nuclear weapons than humanity has TODAY (2012, not ¡2189!) in store? Disintegrate them in the void when you see them coming to your god damn homeworld.
Is the reapers body made of unobtani... I mean adamantium?

Bah, probably is just cooler to use the phasers or something.

Modifié par WilliamDracul88, 26 mars 2012 - 05:28 .

[Sangheili_1337]

I believe it was stated in ME 2 that a thanix cannon only had the firepower of a cruiser. Maybe it is only due to the fact it was mounted on the Normandy which is a really small ship but I don't see how outfitting every ship with these guns would overcome the overwhelming advantages that the Reapers possess.

[Sangheili_1337]

Anteocitis wrote...

Sangheili_1337 wrote...

Anteocitis wrote...

Red Dust wrote...

So no. We can't beat them conventionally. As stated at least twelve times over the course of the game by Admiral Hackett. 

hackett does indeed say that alot, however the codex and what we are shown directly contraditcs that.

How does the codex and what we are shown contradict that.

..because it says, and shows, that we can.

Afghanistan can hurt the United States, that doesnt mean they can defeat us. Destroying a few Reaper destroyers doesnt mean the Reapers can be defeated conventionally.

[The Angry One]

WilliamDracul88 wrote...

And the Earth's plannetary defense systems? Where are the silos? Where are the 10.000 nuclear weapons than humanity has TODAY (2012, not ¡2189!) in store? Disintegrate them in the void when you see them coming to your god damn homeworld.

Anderson says the Reapers systematically destroyed all the old nuclear silos.
Quite why these silos weren't immediately activated and launched at the Reapers is anyone's guess.

[Litany of Fury]

ajm317 wrote...

Personally I think that defeating the Reapers conventionally would have been an even worse ending to the story than the one we got. Civilizations have been trying the "use more guns" approach to beating the Reapers for 10's of millions of years to no success. It would have been pretty silly if the current cycle succeeded using that strategy without some extensive in game explanation that we never got.

Yes we are shown beating the Reapers on multiple occasions, but I actually think all those incidents serve to reinforce the Reapers power, not degrade it. Every time we kill a Reaper we have an overwhelming advantage in numbers or surprise. What's more it is always A Reaper. We never take out a Reaper fleet or even 2 Reapers. Maybe when the entire Quarian Migrant Fleet takes out a single destroy Reaper after multiple volleys the OP takes that as some sort of validation that conventional tactics would work. Personally I see it as confirmation that such tactics are futile against the dozens and dozens of Reapers we see orbiting Earth, to say nothing of the countless Reapers also located at Thessia, Palaven etc.

The thing is though,  our cycle uses the 'shoot moar' tactic, yes - but using the Reaper's capital ship weapons instead of traditional mass effect projectiles. Thanix cannons were fitted to pretty much everything after their initial trial run on an Alliance cruiser, and they are reverse-engineered versions of Sovereign's weapons. Not to mention that Dreadnoughts have had massively scaled-up models of the gun fittted to them that replace their main gun - an already fearsome weapon replaced with something even scarier.

I for one don't think that the Reapers planned for their own massively destructive weapons to be deployed against them en masse, as I reckon there's a fair chance that the other cycles never managed to defeat their version of Sovereign (or maybe Sovereign himself) during peacetime so that they had plenty of time and resurces to revers-engineer weapons from it.

[KRAETZNER]

Apologies if someone has already mentioned this, but the reapers also have no reinforcements. If you kill a reaper, you've just killed an entire species, and set them back 50,000 years. Reapers can only continue happily reaping if they have reapers to reap...therefore if you kill more than the number of reapers they can make, you would make their efforts meaningless. Reapers can make at most, what five reapers per cycle? I've killed atleast three, and it's clear that other people in the galaxy have big guns too, so I'd imagine that dozens of reapers are dieng. Even if they somehow managed to win the war, they'd be completely screwed for the next dozen cycles. They would have to change their patterns to accept less advanced civilizations, and therefore have a weaker reaper force, just to have enough to continue reaping.

[ZLurps]

alberta wrote...

The strength of the Reaper does NOT lie in their numbers - in fact the Reapers are actually few in real numbers. The strength of the Reapers lies in their shields - they only have one frontal gun and to this point in time we have seen how NOT to attack Reapers - front on. That's Napoleonic strategy when armies marched to face each other face to face and used attrition mere yards apart.

They also have tentacle beam weapons. See here:
www.youtube.com/watch

The most cautios calculation of Reaper numbers is 8000. That is extreme case which would mean they failed harvesting, though not destruction in many previous cycled.

Number doesn't include repursoded species, like Protheans, that might have been repurposed to weapons.

[Welsh Inferno]

The Angry One wrote...

Anderson says the Reapers systematically destroyed all the old nuclear silos.
Quite why these silos weren't immediately activated and launched at the Reapers is anyone's guess.

Fear. If our response to an unknown was always to fire nuclear war heads at it we'd all be dead now 

[kleindropper]

Also, its possible that a commando team could board a reaper and blow up its mass effect drive, as shown in the ME2 derelict Reaper

[Sugaki]

The ending was garbage, but the whole story is set up so that the combined might of all the fleets would still end in a hopeless loss. Change that and you change the timbre of the entire story. So no, I don't believe it should've ended with them beating the Reapers with conventional weaponry, otherwise why even bother with a crucible? Would've been a bland story.

That said, it should've at least tried to explain why Thanix cannons weren't effective. I mean it tore through the Collector ship like paper, and they don't use them at all in cutscenes? Massive oversight? It should've shown the Thanix cannons tearing through some Reaper ships, but the Reapers' overwhelming force counteracting that... which it didn't.

The crucible should've something far simpler, without the ridiculous god-child. Like a device that breaks down organic+synthetic synthesis, which tears the Reaper ships apart from the inside. Or a device that breaks indoctrination/harvesting, so that all the Cannibals/Marauder Shields turn against their Reaper creators (and Marauder Shields saying something Arnold-like, like "Harvest this!").

Modifié par Sugaki, 26 mars 2012 - 05:24 .

[WilliamDracul88]

http://en.wikipedia....wiki/Tsar_Bomba

And this is a 50 mt nuclear device from the goddamn 1961. Just make 10.000 of them, triple their power, and make them faster than light with your awesome futuristic tecnology. Hell.

Stop wasting your time in your "Crucible", WE HAVE DISSMISED THOSE CLAIMS.

Modifié par WilliamDracul88, 26 mars 2012 - 05:25 .

[Hudathan]

Not.enough.ships.

Sorry, singling out weakened Reapers is not the same as meeting their entire fleet in open battle. The entire Alliance fleet couldn't kill Sovereign until he got disabled. Just let this issue go.

[ajm317]

Litany of Fury wrote...

ajm317 wrote...

Personally I think that defeating the Reapers conventionally would have been an even worse ending to the story than the one we got. Civilizations have been trying the "use more guns" approach to beating the Reapers for 10's of millions of years to no success. It would have been pretty silly if the current cycle succeeded using that strategy without some extensive in game explanation that we never got.

Yes we are shown beating the Reapers on multiple occasions, but I actually think all those incidents serve to reinforce the Reapers power, not degrade it. Every time we kill a Reaper we have an overwhelming advantage in numbers or surprise. What's more it is always A Reaper. We never take out a Reaper fleet or even 2 Reapers. Maybe when the entire Quarian Migrant Fleet takes out a single destroy Reaper after multiple volleys the OP takes that as some sort of validation that conventional tactics would work. Personally I see it as confirmation that such tactics are futile against the dozens and dozens of Reapers we see orbiting Earth, to say nothing of the countless Reapers also located at Thessia, Palaven etc.

The thing is though,  our cycle uses the 'shoot moar' tactic, yes - but using the Reaper's capital ship weapons instead of traditional mass effect projectiles. Thanix cannons were fitted to pretty much everything after their initial trial run on an Alliance cruiser, and they are reverse-engineered versions of Sovereign's weapons. Not to mention that Dreadnoughts have had massively scaled-up models of the gun fittted to them that replace their main gun - an already fearsome weapon replaced with something even scarier.

I for one don't think that the Reapers planned for their own massively destructive weapons to be deployed against them en masse, as I reckon there's a fair chance that the other cycles never managed to defeat their version of Sovereign (or maybe Sovereign himself) during peacetime so that they had plenty of time and resurces to revers-engineer weapons from it.

I hate the Thanix cannon.

Not so much it's inclusion in the game, but the way fans took it and ran with it.

The Thanix cannon is never described in the game as some kind of wonder weapon that can slice and dice Reapers like a light saber.  It's described as putting cruiser firepower on a frigate.  It's an evolution in weapons technology, not a revolution.  Even in ME2 it wasn't THAT important.  You destroy the Collector ship with or without it, you just lose a crewmember if you don't have it.

And to be honest, it would have been pretty silly if the devolopers answer had been "Thanix cannon FTW."  Why is our cycle the only one to have reverse engineered Reaper weapons?  The Protheans were at war with the Reapers for centuries.  Why didn't they make a Thanix cannon?  Besides, even if the Thanix cannon is all that and a bag of chips, the Reapers have them too.  And theres are bigger, on bigger ships with bigger Element Zero cores that move faster and have more armor.

So I would have been very dissapointed if that was how Bioware had gone with things.

[Sangheili_1337]

What they could have done is have the Crucible cripple the Reapers in some way. Maybe frenzy them so they attack each other. The united galaxy fleet would then finish off the stragglers. Would have been a hell of a lot better than what we got.

[ZLurps]

Sangheili_1337 wrote...

I believe it was stated in ME 2 that a thanix cannon only had the firepower of a cruiser. Maybe it is only due to the fact it was mounted on the Normandy which is a really small ship but I don't see how outfitting every ship with these guns would overcome the overwhelming advantages that the Reapers possess.

I think lot's of expectation comes from that most players never finished ME2 without Thanix cannon upgrade.

With Thanix cannon it takes two shots to destroy the Collector cruiser.
Without Thanix it takes four shots to destroy Collector cruiser.

So Thanix never was anything like 10 x firepower upgrade to begin with.

[KRAETZNER]

Sangheili_1337 wrote...

What they could have done is have the Crucible cripple the Reapers in some way. Maybe frenzy them so they attack each other. The united galaxy fleet would then finish off the stragglers. Would have been a hell of a lot better than what we got.

The only reason reapers are so scary is their shields. One shot with a cannon from a fighter can kill a reaper without his shields. Have the crucible destroy all reaper shields in the galaxy, and suddenly you have calamari for everyone.

[Sepharih]

Sangheili_1337 wrote...
Afghanistan can hurt the United States, that doesnt mean they can defeat us. Destroying a few Reaper destroyers doesnt mean the Reapers can be defeated conventionally.

Again...this is about storytelling.  What your saying is true....but think about the propaganda surrounding the war on both sides.   Get my point?

[Hudathan]

Sangheili_1337 wrote...

What they could have done is have the Crucible cripple the Reapers in some way. Maybe frenzy them so they attack each other. The united galaxy fleet would then finish off the stragglers. Would have been a hell of a lot better than what we got.

If they did that then people would just be up in arms about how it's a Hollywood Independance Day ending. Do you honestly think the same people complaining about the current endings wouldn't rip right through a Reaper-power-button?