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[fchopin]

What would be the point of the starchild if we can have a conventional win?

They might as well create a new game if that is the case as everything we do in ME3 is set from the beginning when we do the Mars mission and everything after that would become irrelevant.

[a.m.p]

George Costanza wrote...

I was genuinely amazed when I got to the end of the game and the crucible was actually a weapon. I thought for sure that it was another method of control left behind by the Reapers to trick us. I didn't think they'd just introduce an off switch at the eleventh hour. It's such a lame concept.

Same here. I was 95% sure that the whole gathering forces and everyone repeating how they have no idea what the crucible does was foreshadowing for the "whoops, reaper trap, you're on your own" plot twist.

It all seems to boil down to whether one believed in the 'reapers are unbeatable' premise or didn't. And that makes for two very different stories, if you think about it - but the existing ending can work as an ending for only one of these stories.

[a.m.p]

Noelemahc wrote...

in-character, with the information she has at that point my Shepard
simply can't go with any of the given options. It's not giving up. She
doesn't know enough about reapers to know for sure it will or will not
be possible. It's putting your trust into your forces rather than the
word of the reaper boss. Which is what every Shepard had always done.

We should picturize this and just post the picture whenever the issue comes up again, I think.

You know, if it helps if I repeat it as many times as they are people on BSN, I'll repeat it as many times as there are people on BSN. Might have to put it in verse at some point though for variety's sake.

[a.m.p]

fchopin wrote...

What would be the point of the starchild if we can have a conventional win?

They might as well create a new game if that is the case as everything we do in ME3 is set from the beginning when we do the Mars mission and everything after that would become irrelevant.

Irrelevant how? We are bringing together a fleet to fight reapers. We aren't building the crucible, it's being built in the background by other people, while our main storyline consists of events that have almost nothing to do with the crucible.

If anything, it would give some actual meaning to the fleet, rather than a random number that determines whether Shepard is allowed to play god or not.

The point of the starchild would be an effective and easy 'right there and then' solution to the reaper problem. What I'm offering will cost the galaxy greatly. It is not an instant 'win'. It is a long war.


Actually, I'm going to ask you the same question I ask everyone who says it undermines the existing endings, pardon my copy-paste.
Would a scenario like this:

Suppose before the fleets are ordered to Earth and Hackett comes aboard, if you reach the required EMS level, Hackett tells you how this fleet is the biggest force the galaxy has ever gathered and that maybe we do
have a chance after all. A few lines acknowleding this. And then the (semi)conventional option, whatever it would be , would unlock upon meeting the catalyst.

Now add the price of picking 'no'. The war continues, most of the people alive at that moment die horribly over the
next few months/years. There will never be a certainty that all reapers were destroyed. If you insist that option kills me/ my LI/ my squad/all of the listed, I'm fine with that too.

While the existing options would allow to solve the problem then and there, minimize casualties and maybe, if
rumors of EC are true, soon rebuild the relays.

still cheapen the existing endings and the final choice for you?

Modifié par a.m.p, 20 avril 2012 - 09:15 .

[fchopin]

a.m.p wrote...

fchopin wrote...

What would be the point of the starchild if we can have a conventional win?

They might as well create a new game if that is the case as everything we do in ME3 is set from the beginning when we do the Mars mission and everything after that would become irrelevant.

Irrelevant how? We are bringing together a fleet to fight reapers. We aren't building the crucible, it's being built in the background by other people, while our main storyline consists of events that have almost nothing to do with the crucible.

If anything, it would give some actual meaning to the fleet, rather than a random number that determines whether Shepard is allowed to play god or not.

The point of the starchild would be an effective and easy 'right there and then' solution to the reaper problem. What I'm offering will cost the galaxy greatly. It is not an instant 'win'. It is a long war.

We are told from the beginning that we cannot win a conventional war and all the different races agree.
 
The whole point of the war assets and all the fleet gathering is to survive and make sure the crucible is build and protected, most of the fleet is used when the crucible is used and they are there to protect it.
 
If you cannot understand that then there is nothing i can say, to win conventionally would require the game to be remade differently.

Modifié par fchopin, 20 avril 2012 - 09:22 .

[a.m.p]

fchopin wrote...

We are told from the beginning that we cannot win a conventional war and all the different races agree.
 
The whole point of the war assets and all the fleet gathering is to survive and make sure the crucible is build and protected, most of the fleet is used when the crucible is used and they are there to protect it.
 
If you cannot understand that then there is nothing i can say, to win conventionally would require the game to be remade differently.

We are told that from the beginning of ME3, yes, I know. That's why I'm offering to add a few lines of dialogue for Hackett so it would not come out of the blue completely.

We don't know that the fleet will be used to protect the crucible and escort it to Earth until the end of the Cronos station mission. Until then our fleets are fighting reapers all over the galaxy. As they should be.

And while I'd love to have the whole crucible plot removed altogether (because it was never needed in the story), I'm fully aware that is not happening, because as you rightfully point out that would require the game to be remade. That is why I'm offering a compromise for the huge amount of people whose interpretation of what they were very ambiguously shown is different from yours.

Modifié par a.m.p, 20 avril 2012 - 09:34 .

[fchopin]

a.m.p wrote...

We are told that from the beginning of ME3, yes, I know. That's why I'm offering to add a few lines of dialogue for Hackett so it would not come out of the blue completely.

We don't know that the fleet will be used to protect the crucible and escort it to Earth until the end of the Cronos station mission. Until then our fleets are fighting reapers all over the galaxy. As they should be.

And while I'd love to have the whole crucible plot removed altogether (because it was never needed in the story), I'm fully aware that is not happening, because as you rightfully point out that would require the game to be remade. That is why I'm offering a compromise for the huge amount of people whose interpretation of what they were very ambiguously shown is different from yours.

But if there was an option to say no to starchild that would be the same as picking the control or synthesis option as both are reaper wins as far as i am concerned.
Saying no means i will not pick an option but will fight a conventional war and die.

[a.m.p]

fchopin wrote...

But if there was an option to say no to starchild that would be the same as picking the control or synthesis option as both are reaper wins as far as i am concerned.
Saying no means i will not pick an option but will fight a conventional war and die.

And we are arguing for an option to fight a conventional war and live. And have so far amassed a significant list of lore to support that, which can be found on the first page of this thread.
The most obvious ones are this (the part about the relays especially) and this.

Which brings us back to the question of price.
I've outlined how much I am willing to pay for a conventional victory earlier (pretty much everything as long as enough people of all species survive to not die out or regress into the stone age and the relay network stays, allowing to effectively rebuild the galactic society).

What about you? How high must be the price of conventional victory for you to not be an easy way out that undermines existing options?

It's a very important question. If it can be answered in a way that satisfies most people, then the compromise is possible.

[omikron199]

This option could bring even worse ending.

You say no, but you can't win by conventional means and what? Reapers won't stop,they just kill or harvest everything. You lost. All choices you made through the game are even more meaningless since all are dead/harvested/ascended. You did nothing.

But put that aside. Why Shepard would sacriface trillions of military lifes to fight Reapers when he could just sacriface his own. 1 against a trillion. Simple logic, he is military, hero etc. And maybe he is not stupid and could find that 1 death is better than trillion.

Modifié par omikron199, 20 avril 2012 - 09:52 .

[a.m.p]

[quote]omikron199 wrote...

This option could bring even worse ending.

You say no, but you can't win by conventional means and what? Reapers won't stop,they just kill or harvest everything. You lost. All choices you made through the game are even more meaningless since all are dead/harvested/ascended. You did nothing.

But put that aside. Why Shepard would sacriface trillions of military lifes to fight Reapers when he could just sacriface his own. 1 against a trillion. Simple logic, he is military, hero etc. And maybe he is not stupid and could find that 1 death is better than trillion.
[/quote]

1. We're arguing for an option to reject starchild and win.

2. This:
[quote]a.m.p wrote...

[quote]Noelemahc wrote...

[quote]in-character, with the information she has at that point my Shepard simply can't go with any of the given options. It's not giving up. She doesn't know enough about reapers to know for sure it will or will not be possible. It's putting your trust into your forces rather than the word of the reaper boss. Which is what every Shepard had always done.
[/quote]
We should picturize this and just post the picture whenever the issue comes up again, I think.
[/quote]

Modifié par a.m.p, 20 avril 2012 - 10:01 .

[fchopin]

a.m.p wrote...

fchopin wrote...

But if there was an option to say no to starchild that would be the same as picking the control or synthesis option as both are reaper wins as far as i am concerned.
Saying no means i will not pick an option but will fight a conventional war and die.

And we are arguing for an option to fight a conventional war and live. And have so far amassed a significant list of lore to support that, which can be found on the first page of this thread.
The most obvious ones are this (the part about the relays especially) and this.

Which brings us back to the question of price.
I've outlined how much I am willing to pay for a conventional victory earlier (pretty much everything as long as enough people of all species survive to not die out or regress into the stone age and the relay network stays, allowing to effectively rebuild the galactic society).

What about you? How high must be the price of conventional victory for you to not be an easy way out that undermines existing options?

It's a very important question. If it can be answered in a way that satisfies most people, then the compromise is possible.

For me if Bioware wanted a conventional win would mean that ME2 would have to be redone.
If ME2 was done in such a way that the council believed Shepard and all the resources of the council was used to find weaknesses in the reaper shields or some other means was used  to find a way to win it would be perfect and make sense.
 
The way ME2 was done with the council not interested in getting ready meant that there was no way for us to win conventionally and Bioware was going for a Sci-Fi win which is nothing new in Sci-Fi books.
 
That is one reason i was very upset with ME2 and i criticised the game harshly as i expected better sense and story.
 
We are not ready in ME3 and we are in a war that no race was prepared for so expecting to win a war conventionally against an enemy who has been doing this for millions of years would look very silly to me.

[Zolt51]

Elyiia wrote...

At least 800,000. I like how you provided evidence as to how you came to this number.

Hmm, interesting question actually.

Let's rewind back to ME1.
For one reaper it took:
 - The Alliance 3rd and 5th fleet. 
 - At least 2 full Turian Fleets
 - The Destiny ascension plus assorted Salarian and Asari fleets.
 - The Normandy SR1
 - Shepard managing to bring down Sovereign's shields.

>> It should be possible to quantify the above as war assets. I'll be conservative and say 800. I don't have the war asset list with me, but if anyone can do it...

It can't even be argued that Sovereign was fighting really hard. He was stationary and focused most of his attention on activating the Citadel and fighting Shepard.

Now multiply that by about 1000 reapers. 800.000. Voila

[a.m.p]

fchopin wrote...

For me if Bioware wanted a conventional win would mean that ME2 would have to be redone.
If ME2 was done in such a way that the council believed Shepard and all the resources of the council was used to find weaknesses in the reaper shields or some other means was used  to find a way to win it would be perfect and make sense.
 
The way ME2 was done with the council not interested in getting ready meant that there was no way for us to win conventionally and Bioware was going for a Sci-Fi win which is nothing new in Sci-Fi books.
 
That is one reason i was very upset with ME2 and i criticised the game harshly as i expected better sense and story.
 
We are not ready in ME3 and we are in a war that no race was prepared for so expecting to win a war conventionally against an enemy who has been doing this for millions of years would look very silly to me.

1) ME2 main plot was a mess, as was the idea that the council did nothing, no arguments here (again, it pales compared to the crucible and I found that I don't even mind it that much now).

2) However. And that is very important. Nowhere in ME2 was it established that the reapers were unveatable conventionally. Moreover, the introduction of thanix cannons + arrival, and the fact that I routinely shoot the big reaper baby with my mattock, just because I can, hinted at the opposite.

Equally important was that nowhere in ME2 or ME1 was a reaper off button foreshadowed. Neither we as a player, nor the characters in-universe had any reason to think they would not have to fight the reapers with what they had. And they were preparing for it as best they could. Again - Thanix cannons as an example. For the council being dumb Joker offered a perfectly valid excuse that could be used in ME3: They were preparing, they simply didn't tell you, because you were with Cerberus. Which is your usual political level of dumb, not the criminally incompetent, shoot on sight level of dumb that ignoring the threat altogether is.

3)  The reapers being unbeatable conventionally premise was introduced only in ME3. Only to justify using the crucible. In direct contradiction with established lore that had to be ingnored and worked around or retconned. I've gone through all the evidence with half a dozen people a dozen times. The only thing that a conventional victory would directly contradict is Hackett's dialogue. Which is why I'm offering to fix it with a few lines.

[a.m.p]

Zolt51 wrote...

Elyiia wrote...

At least 800,000. I like how you provided evidence as to how you came to this number.

Hmm, interesting question actually.

Let's rewind back to ME1.
For one reaper it took:
 - The Alliance 3rd and 5th fleet. 
 - At least 2 full Turian Fleets
 - The Destiny ascension plus assorted Salarian and Asari fleets.
 - The Normandy SR1
 - Shepard managing to bring down Sovereign's shields.

>> It should be possible to quantify the above as war assets. I'll be conservative and say 800. I don't have the war asset list with me, but if anyone can do it...

It can't even be argued that Sovereign was fighting really hard. He was stationary and focused most of his attention on activating the Citadel and fighting Shepard.

Now multiply that by about 1000 reapers. 800.000. Voila

The war asset system makes as much sense as the crucible itself. Before we try to quantify Sovereign, first tell me what one unit of war assets is? Considering the reporter I didn't punch equals 1/9th of one of the major alliance fleets.

Also as you point out, Sovereign wasn't even fighting that much. The geth were (who are now on our side). You can't put this into simple numbers and pretend they mean anything more than a silly gameplay mecahnic.

[The Angry One]

Yep, EMS is abstract beyond uselessness. An Alliance fleet is 65, Destiny Ascension is 70.
Kahlee Sanders is 30. Kahlee Sanders is worth half an Alliance fleet or almost half of one Asari dreadnought. Right.

Don't get me started on the MP N7 squad.

Modifié par The Angry One, 20 avril 2012 - 10:25 .

[omikron199]

a.m.p wrote...



1. We're arguing for an option to reject starchild and win.

Loosing 1 life against loosing millions of lives? That's not a win that's idiotism.

Also how would you win by conventional means an opponent that was winning for billion+ years and probably knows every possible strategy and tactics in the galaxy?

Also if reapers exist for 1 billion year there are around 20000 capital ships and who knows how many destroyer ships. As stated above - dealing with 1 capital ship took great number of human, asari, salarian, turian space ships, despite the fact that Sovereign did not have shields.

Also destroyer reaper on rannoch took the firepower of an entire quarian and geth fleet to be destroyed.

So no, rejecting starkid (how bad and stupid etc. he is) is suicide
Rejecting not logically possible.

Modifié par omikron199, 20 avril 2012 - 10:29 .

[a.m.p]

omikron199 wrote...

a.m.p wrote...

1. We're arguing for an option to reject starchild and win.

Loosing 1 life against loosing millions of lives? That's not a win that's idiotism.

In-character, (oh boy, we do need that picture after all), I have no reason to believe that shooting the tube/jumping into light/grabbing joysticks will stop the cycle. The idiot who started the cycle told me it would. And I trust him... why? I don't know what the crucible does. How do I know it won't instead destroy all technology except the reapers?

Good take on why reaper numbers can not be approximated with the info we have is here. Short version - everything you list is in-universe our our as players speculation. Math based on assumptions and baseless speculations does not give approximations.

As for the rannoch reaper, I'll repost my post from my other thread in a moment.

[a.m.p]

Copy-pasting from here.

The rannoch reaper is a very frequent argument for reaper invincibility. We had to synch up the whole fleet to our
targeting laser to shoot it down, you see.

So I've been asking myself: why am I subconsciously unimpressed by that particular instance of reaper invincibility? I decided to look at it again very carefully. Here is what I saw.
Game screenshots with enhanced contrast below:
#1
../../..//uploads_user/3737000/3736571/198094.jpg

#2
../../..//uploads_user/3737000/3736571/198095.jpg

That is not a whole fleet shooting. That’s 3-4 civilian Alarei-type ships with some basic weapons slapped on them shooting.

Here is a whole fleet shooting:
../../..//uploads_user/3737000/3736571/198093.jpg

So I present you a brand new theory. Admiral Han'Gerrel in an ***hole. When Shepard tells him not to shoot, he shoots. When Shepard tells him to shoot, he doesn't. Hell, and I didn't even punch him. (allright, kidding).

On a more serious note, correct me if I'm wrong, but the fleet was sitting in orbit in a tight formation trying to protect
the more valuable and fragile civillian ships from geth fire, right? That would probably limit their ability to shoot something on the planet with everything they have - they would simply hit each other. So as the cutscene shows us, the ships closest to the planet with a clear line of sight are shooting.

Modifié par a.m.p, 20 avril 2012 - 10:37 .

[2Shepards]

Love this thread, great job OP.

[The Angry One]

Nice pics. I keep arguing that it's obviously not the whole fleet firing but people are too hung up on what Shepard says.

Anyway, it makes sense. First, Gerrel will give Shepard what he can, but he's still fighting the Geth.
Second, they're not going to use their heavy weapons or they will fry Shepard and the whole area. This is a precision strike, not carpet bombing.

[George Costanza]

The Reapers have been doing it for maybe billions of years but this is the first time (we know of) that they've come up against a united galaxy without being about to use the relays against them. Their standard strategy is wiping out the top brass at the citadel and then picking the rest off during the confusion before they have chance to properly prepare.

Here, there's a united galaxy, and the Reapers have lost their surprise advantage. The Reapers aren't indestructible - two are taken out in this game alone. I don't see any reason why it couldn't be a conventional, albeit difficult victory.

Frankly, it would have been a much more satisfying end even if many characters I loved died. At least they would have died for a reason and the sacrifice would have meant something.

[a.m.p]

@2Shepards
Thanks. As I said, anything relevant anyone happens to find that I missed, will gladly add it to the pile.

The Angry One wrote...

Nice pics. I keep arguing that it's obviously not the whole fleet firing but people are too hung up on what Shepard says.

Anyway, it makes sense. First, Gerrel will give Shepard what he can, but he's still fighting the Geth.
Second, they're not going to use their heavy weapons or they will fry Shepard and the whole area. This is a precision strike, not carpet bombing.

Not to mention the precision strike is not even that precise. Most of the shots land around him and on the armor, it's just the last few that actually hit the weak spot.

And I am still confused, why, if they decided that thanix cannons were useless, couldn't we see at least one instance of a thanix cannon hitting a reaper and doing next to no damage. The issue is just carefully glossed over.

[a.m.p]

George Costanza wrote...

The Reapers have been doing it for maybe billions of years but this is the first time (we know of) that they've come up against a united galaxy without being about to use the relays against them. Their standard strategy is wiping out the top brass at the citadel and then picking the rest off during the confusion before they have chance to properly prepare.

This too. The question of why exactly the reapers have been fignting the isolated and scattered protheans for decades and then mopping up what remained for centuries, but somehow are supposed to bring a united galaxy to the brink of annihilation in mere months, still stands.

Modifié par a.m.p, 20 avril 2012 - 11:03 .

[fchopin]

a.m.p wrote...

What about you? How high must be the price of conventional victory for you to not be an easy way out that undermines existing options?

It's a very important question. If it can be answered in a way that satisfies most people, then the compromise is possible.

The only way this would be acceptable is for Earth to be completely destroyed as well as most of the fleet and a few reapers then the rest of the reapers retreat to some other place for the next fight.
 
Then the game ends and the war continues for a few years until there is nothing left apart for some new race which is developing technologically and will probably take over the galaxy because there would be few races with the technology to stop them.

[Noelemahc]

And I am still confused, why, if they decided that thanix cannons were useless, couldn't we see at least one instance of a thanix cannon hitting a reaper and doing next to no damage. The issue is just carefully glossed over.

Not the first time they failed "Show, don't tell" in the game, huh. I'm thinking it was one of the three:
a) cutting costs on making such a cutscene
not realizing it would be more effective to show rather than tell
c) forgetting about Thanix cannons altogether

Or a combination thereof.

In any case, good job with the pictures. Better yet, in the same cutscene of the fight over Urth, we actually SEE several Reapers breaking apart from just the first volley of the Human/Turian fleets, because that's what that sequence shows us -- there aren't any cutscenes of geth ships at all, and none of quarian ships fighting over Urth. It's like they tried their hardest to convince us that common warfare won't cut it, because, see, see, turians aren't enough to kill everyone! Who cares if there are three more large battle-ready fleets right behind them?

The only way this would be acceptable is for Earth to be completely
destroyed as well as most of the fleet and a few reapers then the rest
of the reapers retreat to some other place for the next fight.
 
Then
the game ends and the war continues for a few years until there is
nothing left apart for some new race which is developing technologically
and will probably take over the galaxy because there would be few races
with the technology to stop them.

The sad part is that this IS in the game. The plot slowly but surely prepares us to accept that the Yahg will be that race... and then the ending doesn't reveal jack.

Modifié par Noelemahc, 20 avril 2012 - 11:08 .