Joccaren wrote...
Yes, they are winning everywhere. They are fighting several non-unified forces across the galaxy, and those non-unified forces are getting their asses kicked. A unified force, however, focusing on one world, would overwhelm the Reapers. There are around than 20,000 Reapers in existance [Leviathin of Dis is 1 billion years old. Divide 50,000 and you get 20,000. Throughout the cycles, several Reapers have been killed or incapacitated. In general, 1 Reaper is made per cycle. However, note the Protheans were unable to be made into Reapers - so that is another cycle wasted as losses were not recouped. This may have happened several times in 20,000 cycles]
So, around 20,000 Reapers v my fleet. Quarian Flotilla: 50K or so ships. Geth fleet is larger, stronger and has more dreadnoughts as they weren't held by the Treaty of Firaxen. That is over 50K ships. With just the Quarians and the Geth that is enough ships for a 5:1 Ratio. For the whole potential Reaper fleet. I'd wager less than half is at Earth. 10:1 Ratio. Add in the Alliance ships, the Turian Ships, Asari, Salarian - The Reapers are outnumbered and outgunned. Earth at the very least could be recouped. After that, taking out the smaller lots of Reapers throughout the Galaxy to ensure minimal losses whilst doing so, before focusing down the remaining high level Reaper threats.
Taking on a number of smaller enemies with Overwhelming force is a far more sound strategy than facing one large enemy with overwhelming force.
I never noticed the Citadel being heavily defended actually. The Destiny Ascension - the flagship of its fleet - isn't there, and it is likely that all fleets began mobilising to gather at a unified location for an attack to capture whatever the Catalyst was, and end the Reaper threat. The Citadel defence force would have remained behind, but they are no match for Giant Sentient starships - even with hacked Cerberus turrets.
Again, 1 fleet - not even the strongest fleet - vs the largest concentration of Reapers. Human, Quarian, Geth, Turian, Asari, Salarian, Volus, Terminus, Batarian - ect. fleets vs 1 Reaper fleet at a time, smells like victory to me.
Yet Hackett has never fought a force like the Reapers before, and never with a fleet made of every ship in the galaxy. I'd say he's out of his depth in deciding what is and isn't plausible in this type of war.
Beams that can be dodged. Check the successful Sword battle cinematic: Reapers fire at us, we dodge their shots. 1 ship falls, but so does 1 Reaper capital ship.
Sovereign class dreadnoughts are what you'd call rare in the Reaper fleet. According to the Codex, the vast majority of Reaper ships are mere destroyers. 1 Dreadnought could likely take them down, as could a handful of cruisers - again, without Thanix guns. Most ships have been equipped with Thanix guns.
Over 100 Dreadnoughts [All with Thanix guns, take the notch down to 3 to 1] could take out over 33 Sovereign class Reapers in an engagement between just that lot. Add cruiser Thanix Fire, Frigate Thanix fire and the fact that you are engaging small portions of the Reaper fleet at once, and that Sovereign classes are relatively rare in the Reaper fleet - Reapers are in a bit of trouble in each individual battle.
Which is an interesting point. They never attacked the Citadel and shut down all Relays - which was always their main battle strategy. It makes little sense as to why this never happened: Completely cut off the entire galaxy and its fleets, and thereby be left with minimum casualties on your own side, or fight conventionally, face higher casualties on your side and allow all species to manouvre around the galaxy still. Reaper tactics: Out the window as soon as the invasion began.
Agreed. Honestly, what I foresaw for ME3 was gathering the galactic fleets, whilst finding out an effective way to hit the Reapers, then throwing it all in. I've covered the 5 or so endings that would be possible from this somewhere else, but briefly:
-Epic failure. Everyone dies, nothing passed down to next cycle.
-Moderate Failure. Everyone dies, Liara sends her message and it is found by next cycle
-Failure: Galaxy falls, but takes out some Reapers on its way. Liara's message is found by next cycle, who use the Citadel Relay to Darkspace as an ambush location when the next Reaper invasion starts - hitting the Reapers the second they leave Darkspace and come through the Citadel.
-Success: Galaxy fights Reapers and wins, but with extreme losses. Earth may be saved, but Palaven, Thessia and numerous other worlds are lost. Majority of fleets destroyed. Ill will towards humanity as their homeworld was saved, whilst others were sacrificed.
-Epic Successs: Galaxy defeats Reapers in the most effective way possible. Reaper forces are decimated. Earth is saved, Palaven and Thessia are saved, as is the majority of the galaxy. Fleets all but destroyed, but the men and women lost are regarded as heroes, resulting in increased sign ups to peacekeeping forces throughout the Galaxy. Galaxy enters a golden age of peace.
Cliche? Yeah. But hey, a lot of people like Cliche, and it does provide opportunites for a few different outcomes.
See above. Vast majority of Reaper forces are destroyers - the 170m kind - while there are relatively few Sovereign class Capital ships. They have done this approximately 20K times, and either 1 Sovereign class Reaper, or a few other Reapers [Destroyer, Troop Transport, Slaughter Ship], have come out of each cycle.
Yeah, that is one of the main things I hate about the ending, and hell, I don't think a lot of people care about Shepard as much as they do him being the Shepard we wrote. Far more impactful would be something like the Normandy ramming Harbinger, taking him out to save Shepard or someone else. That is something we would feel. Joker, EDI, Traynor, Adams, Gabby, Donnely - our crew just died. A lot of people would feel that a lot more than Shepard's death. Yeah, Shepard wouldn't be a Christ figure - he wouldn't die on the Crucible before the Catalyst to save the Galaxy - but does he really need to be? He's our Shepard, and a lot of people are POd at the fact his death is forced in such a way, and a lot would rather it either happen naturally, or not at all.
I completely agree with your post, this was really how I thought ME3 was going to play out before the Mars mission where the Reaper off-switch was discovered. I thought it'd just be about gathering the Galactic forces, perhaps finding a slight weakness to the Reapers, and then destroying them in stages, instead I got space magic.
To Alan Schumacher, thanks for all of your posts, I've enjoyed reading them. I especially appreciated one idea you presented that I hadn't thought about, and possibly explains a lot about the possibilities and odd occurrences with the Destroy ending. How perhaps with a really high EMS (over 4,000 which is impossible to achieve without playing multiplayer or downloading the Apps) the Crucible is more precise than Casper anticipated, and it only targets the Reapers, leaving the Geth and EDI (along with Shepard) alive. I also personally felt that Casper was an unreliable narrator, and that he may be lying about what the Destroy option does (It even says "If you want you can destroy all Synthetic life," not if you pick this option it actually will). At first I picked the Synthesis ending really only because EDI and Joker hugged in it (and I thought at least someone should get a happy ending) but after ruminating a bit, I went back and did the Destroy ending with Shepard breathing afterwards (it's the only option that makes even a slight amount of sense).
What do you think about the possibility that the Crucible is actually a Reaper trap, in a similar fashion as the Mass Relays. The Reapers want the Galaxy’s advanced civilizations’ resistance to evolve along a certain pattern and to achieve this they provide plans allegedly created/added-to by all of the previous cycles. I mean look at how much effort this cycle’s Galactic Alliance put into building the Crucible, a weapon that they have no idea of what it does. Perhaps it acts like a phallus (which it definitely looks like) for the Citadel/Casper to finish creating the new Human Reaper. Or perhaps it’s just completely useless and only serves as a waste of time/resources/man-power for the advanced organic forces. You could however still use it to get the current endings. In Control and Synthesis, Shepard becomes the mind of the Human Reaper, and in Destroy Hackett could have added a Self-Destruct System to the Crucible that when activated destroys the Citadel and, if the God Child actually controls the Reapers, destroys them as well. I personally just find the whole presentation of the Crucible to be so fishy, especially when the Reapers have to know of its existence and yet they allow it to be built uninhibited. If the Reapers do have a very strong sense of self-preservation (which is heavily implied during discussions with EDI) then they would not allow the production (especially across all of the cycles) of a weapon that even had a miniscule chance of destroying them.
Modifié par BigZ7337, 09 avril 2012 - 07:10 .
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