258 réponses à ce sujet

[Elyiia]

Ieldra2 wrote...

Nice, OP. I have once estimated the number of Reapers at about 4000. Not too different from yours, so I think we're in the plausible range. But I don't agree that a conventional victory should be possible against them. It took the whole quarian fleet to take out a Destroyer-class Reaper. It would be a war of attrition the Reapers would be bound to win.

No, it didn't. It took a small portion of the Quarian fleet. Look at the cutscene.

EDIT: And as I understand it, firing upon a target on the ground is far less effective due to the drag that occurs from the projectile entering the atmosphere.

Modifié par Elyiia, 30 avril 2012 - 12:54 .

[The Angry One]

nhcre8tv1 wrote...

The Reapers are millions of other things. Of course they aren't dumb.

They transported the Citadel to Earth to keep it away from the Crucible, then provided a convenient back door directly to it's control console for no reason.
I have a hard time finding any explanation for this other than "they're extremely stupid."

.... why does the reconfigured Citadel have such an easily accessable, organic friendly control console anyway?

Modifié par The Angry One, 30 avril 2012 - 01:11 .

[a.m.p]

Wulfram wrote...

Do we have evidence that Reaper capital ships are deployed outside of the main campaigns against Council race homeworlds? I wouldn't necessarily expect them to - not until they'd destroyed the major enemy fleets, anyway.

Not that I know of, apart from the aforementioned outrun six space squids minigame, which I tend to not take into account. But if we confine all reapers to the homeworlds and take into account that the war went on for months then we barely get enough to fit the ME2 group shot.

edit: random theory:  The reapers deliberately allowed the fight for Palaven to continue, in order to keep the Turians pinned down.  If they'd deployed overwhelming force to finish it, then the Turians would have done what the Humans and Asari did, and cut their losses.  As it was, the Reapers most dangerous foe was obliged to spend the war throwing it's resources at a hopeless battle - and even managed to drag the Krogan into it, too.

Of course, this bit the reapers in the behind with the "Miracle at Palaven"

Good theory, which again, requires reapers to have limited numbers to be the optimal strategy. See, trying to keep the turians pinned down and losing sov-class reapers to do so implies that if the turians weren't pinned down, that would result in more sov-class reapers dead. It also implies that they don't have enough reapers to hunt down and finish off the turian fleet altogether.

@Ieldra2
I'm glad we can agree on the numbers.
As for the quarian fleet, like Elyiia points out, it did not take the whole fleet.

Modifié par a.m.p, 30 avril 2012 - 01:18 .

[Noelemahc]

Golden words. We should put that into a frame and onto a wall. In Hackett's office.

I think I love you, in whichever platonic and safe way will not get my head split in twain by my girlfriend for saying that to somebody on the Interwebs.

Fixers0 wrote...

Elyiia wrote...

Imagine how many fighters could have been built instead of the Crucible

What good is it to have Superweapon that does nothing anyway, useless.

Shouldn't that be whatever your Shepard told Admiral Mikhailovich as an argument why you didn't build the gadzillion fighters one could buy for the kind of money the Normandy's creation required?

The reapers deliberately allowed the fight for Palaven to continue, in order to keep the Turians pinned down. If they'd deployed overwhelming force to finish it, then the Turians would have done what the Humans and Asari did, and cut their losses.

And instead they spared the turian fleet its destruction, allowing it to cut the losses anyway, but at somewhat of a cost to the Reaper forces that were keeping them busy? Theoretically feasible, although without precise numbers we won't ever know which theory was more justified, I'm afraid. Either way, fighting a war of attrition was what the Protheans used to stall the Reapers, as Javik explains somewhere in the beginning of the game. It benefits the Reapers a lot less than the races being Reaped,

.... why does the reconfigured Citadel have such an easily accessable, organic friendly control console anyway?

Theoretically so that Keepers would use it. Which is stupid in itself, as Keeper-only consoles are impenetrably uselessly impractical for non-Keepers, as it should be in line with their role on the Citadel. So yeah, good point, unless TIM carried it in on his back (which, while unlikely, is equally stupid), it's a plothole. One more for the bonfire =)

[The Angry One]

I can never remember the name of the system, but it's one in the Turian cluster.
The one with no planets and one towed in asteroid, it's description says that Turian forces have held onto it as it's their major fuel refinery.

Despite the Reaper standard MO of destroying all infrastructure in a cluster, they didn't destroy this, at least in the first half of the game. I've never checked later.
I would say they didn't because they couldn't. It would divert too many Reapers away from Palaven to be able to destroy it.

[a.m.p]

The Angry One wrote...

nhcre8tv1 wrote...

The Reapers are millions of other things. Of course they aren't dumb.

They transported the Citadel to Earth to keep it away from the Crucible, then provided a convenient back door directly to it's control console for no reason.
I have a hard time finding any explanation for this other than "they're extremely stupid."

.... why does the reconfigured Citadel have such an easily accessable, organic friendly control console anyway?

I have no flipping idea.

Edit: www.youtube.com/watch

Modifié par a.m.p, 30 avril 2012 - 01:21 .

[The Angry One]

Noelemahc wrote...

Shouldn't that be whatever your Shepard told Admiral Mikhailovich as an argument why you didn't build the gadzillion fighters one could buy for the kind of money the Normandy's creation required?

The Normandy is actually useful, with a known and quantifiable effect.

Modifié par The Angry One, 30 avril 2012 - 01:21 .

[Elyiia]

Noelemahc wrote...
Shouldn't that be whatever your Shepard told Admiral Mikhailovich as an argument why you didn't build the gadzillion fighters one could buy for the kind of money the Normandy's creation required?

The Normandy had a practical use, the Crucible was going to do "something."

Also, I literally just talked to EDI and she mentions that the Reapers are trying to lure the leaders of the resistance onto the superstructures so they can indoctrinate them. That doesn't sound like overwhelming force to me.

[Noelemahc]

The Normandy is actually useful, with a known and quantifiable effect.

Mikhailovich didn't know that at the time. Neither do we before we build the Crucible. As much as I hate its intended use in the game, until the very end, Shepard doesn't have any hard arguments to use against its construction other than "We don't know what it does! It might be a suicide button for the galaxy for all we know!"

[a.m.p]

Noelemahc wrote...

I think I love you, in whichever platonic and safe way will not get my head split in twain by my girlfriend for saying that to somebody on the Interwebs.

Do be careful, please, we can't afford to lose you

.... why does the reconfigured Citadel have such an easily accessable, organic friendly control console anyway?

Theoretically so that Keepers would use it. Which is stupid in itself, as Keeper-only consoles are impenetrably uselessly impractical for non-Keepers, as it should be in line with their role on the Citadel. So yeah, good point, unless TIM carried it in on his back (which, while unlikely, is equally stupid), it's a plothole. One more for the bonfire =)

Now that I think of it, what about the citadel master control unit? What would have changed if the citadel arms were opened from the same place they were opened previously? Just make it so the crucible docked to the top of the tower and not to the bottom and your ending makes 8% more sense, and you don't have to design a whole new area.

Shepard doesn't have any hard arguments to use against its construction other than "We don't know what it does! It might be a suicide button for the galaxy for all we know!"

Hard enough argument for me.

Modifié par a.m.p, 30 avril 2012 - 01:33 .

[The Angry One]

Noelemahc wrote...

The Normandy is actually useful, with a known and quantifiable effect.

Mikhailovich didn't know that at the time. Neither do we before we build the Crucible. As much as I hate its intended use in the game, until the very end, Shepard doesn't have any hard arguments to use against its construction other than "We don't know what it does! It might be a suicide button for the galaxy for all we know!"

Mikhailovich didn't know the Normandy was a stealth ship? I don't remember this.

But assuming you're right, clearly he knew that somebody did know. As in, Anderson, Shepard, the Normandy's crew, the people who designed and built it.
People knew. If he didn't know, that's irrelevant. The Crucible on the other hand, nobody knew what it did, not even the people building it.

[Subject M]

Reapers behave according to classic space opera cinematics. Thats why some people get the impression of that they can be defeated conventionally. The reason they can not be is because that is not their function in the narrative. If it was a more "realistic" portrayal, the reapers would use tactics that would correspond to an intelligence several orders of magnitude above that of our heroes. The only way to have a hope of defeating such a foe would be to have something of at least comparable intelligence a and power on your side. With the geth dyson sphere out of the picture, there is no such force.

[a.m.p]

The Angry One wrote...

Mikhailovich didn't know the Normandy was a stealth ship? I don't remember this.

But assuming you're right, clearly he knew that somebody did know. As in, Anderson, Shepard, the Normandy's crew, the people who designed and built it.
People knew. If he didn't know, that's irrelevant. The Crucible on the other hand, nobody knew what it did, not even the people building it.

Yep.
If it had to be in the game, it at least had to be optional to some degree. Maybe allow the player to decide how many resources they spend on it and how many on more ships. Which would determine, whether it could actually kill the reapers or whether the fleet was strong enough to beat them without it.

Modifié par a.m.p, 30 avril 2012 - 01:36 .

[The Angry One]

a.m.p wrote...

The Angry One wrote...

Mikhailovich didn't know the Normandy was a stealth ship? I don't remember this.

But assuming you're right, clearly he knew that somebody did know. As in, Anderson, Shepard, the Normandy's crew, the people who designed and built it.
People knew. If he didn't know, that's irrelevant. The Crucible on the other hand, nobody knew what it did, not even the people building it.

Yep.
If it had to be in the game, it at least had to be optional to some degree. Maybe allow the player to decide how many resources they spend on it and how many on more ships. Which would determine, whether it could actually kill the reapers or whether the fleet was strong enough to beat them without it.

That would've been ideal.
Seperate Crucible and fleet development, with different outcomes for each. Maybe even allow for a balance between the two (since you'd need a good fleet to protect the Crucible anyway), but spreading out too much guarantees you a bad ending.

There could even be an option to concentrate on fleet development and use the Crucible as a decoy to lure Harbinger or something like that.

[a.m.p]

Subject M wrote...

Reapers behave according to classic space opera cinematics. Thats why some people get the impression of that they can be defeated conventionally. The reason they can not be is because that is not their function in the narrative. If it was a more "realistic" portrayal, the reapers would use tactics that would correspond to an intelligence several orders of magnitude above that of our heroes. The only way to have a hope of defeating such a foe would be to have something of at least comparable intelligence a and power on your side. With the geth dyson sphere out of the picture, there is no such force.

That's why I'm using the cutscenes only to determine how many reapers there are in Sol and don't analyze their combat tactics (which are classic space opera cinematics kind of silly).

The problem with writing something that is several orders of magnitude above human intelligence is that the writers themselves are human. They tried and obviously failed because we have to construct whole theories that explain why the reapers aren't actualy morons. The narrative is broken. Could be fixed somewhat by stating that there aren't that many of them and they are spread thin.

Modifié par a.m.p, 30 avril 2012 - 01:54 .

[Noelemahc]

Mikhailovich didn't know the Normandy was a stealth ship? I don't remember this.

He did, he just advocated that it's too bloody expensive to be useful. Then again, he's been reduced to a war asset with no lines OR e-mails in ME3, so we shouldn't take his words on faith =)

Now that I think of it, what about the citadel master control unit? What would have changed if the citadel arms were opened from the same place they were opened previously?

No elevator to elevate you up to the Crucible. Also, even more sexually suggestive docking procedure. In fact, except for the docking procedure, there's no reason why the Crucible has to attach to the spire's backside/underside/whatchamacallit.
The sad part is that the level IS in the game - Liara and Sheppy Shep present the Crucible to the Council there. When we were beaming up, I expected we'd be retracing our ME1 ending steps, to hammer in the subliminal message of the Council Chambers one last time, but apparently either they thought better of it, or forgot it was there to begin with. Perhaps that's why they failed?

The reason they can not be is because that is not their function in the narrative. If it was a more "realistic" portrayal, the reapers would use tactics that would correspond to an intelligence several orders of magnitude above that of our heroes.

Yes, I've seen someone wrote a beautacious essay on why ME succeeds as a classic Greek epic SPECIFICALLY because of the ending. Sadly, we weren't advertised a Greek epic, we were advertised a space romance operatic Decon/Recon epic. While they nailed the Decon once again, ME3 is entirely devoid of Recon, which was the main reason people fell in love with ME1 to begin with. Perhaps that's why they failed?

Which would determine, whether it could actually kill the reapers or whether the fleet was strong enough to beat them without it.

I know I've probably gotten onto everyone's nerves with this, but I've only just finished SMT Devil Survivor for the first time.

It was the first time I saw that a videogame delivered a non-standard game over not only as a valid ending, but also as an optimistic (if very anvilicious) ending.

In short, instead of fighting the Big Bads in order to help one of the sides of the demonic conflict, the player might disregard whatever plot choices he has made up until the end and the ending options it has provided him with, take his party and make a run for it out of the cataclysm zone (which, in a few hours, is supposed to be nuked as a final alternative), reasoning that if they escape the isolation zone, the nuke will not be used as containment failed. They're right, it's not used. Which lets the demons escape, take over all of Japan and then the Earth.

Did you win? Yes. Did you lose? Yes. Was it awesome? Yes, yes it was awesome.

I'm replaying it now, now aiming to fix the decisions I've made, because I've only been offered the local equivalent of "Control" mixed with "Synthesis" - God steps in with divine intervention, banishes the demons, but all humans on all the Earth lose free will as a result. Any dissent and you're disintegrated, no second chances, no forgiveness, no remorse. I said "frell this" and opted to turn Earth into hell. Mainly because I know that in the remake, this ending gets retconned - you get an optional extra bonus chapter to STOP the demons from leaving the containment zone specifically so that they COULD be nuked or disposed of in some other way.

Speaking of which... Yes, this is a non-linear RPG. One that is voiced over in two languages (Japanese and English) in the remake. And the remake not only retcons the worst ending into the BEST ending, it also extends almost all of the endings by an extra chapter that is fully playable and affects the final outcome. Lesson to learn there, BioWare!

That would've been ideal.
Seperate Crucible and fleet development, with different outcomes for each. Maybe even allow for a balance between the two (since you'd need a good fleet to protect the Crucible anyway), but spreading out too much guarantees you a bad ending.

There could even be an option to concentrate on fleet development and use the Crucible as a decoy to lure Harbinger or something like that.

So, like the Engineer decision on the SPECTRE terminal, blown to the game-size proportions? I've already said several times - if the game had fleet management at least a-la Evil Genius (or, if you prefer, Dune I) as an aside to the adventuring portion, it would'a been 20% more awesome and any and all failure would've lain firmly on Sheppy Shep's shoulders. He's gonna be a scapegoat (wrote spacegoat there originally, haha) anyway whatever the outcome. Might as well get the great power to justify the great responsibility.

Modifié par Noelemahc, 30 avril 2012 - 02:02 .

[The Angry One]

Noelemahc wrote...
 I said "frell this" and opted to turn Earth into hell. Mainly because I know that in the remake, this ending gets retconned - you get an optional extra bonus chapter to STOP the demons from leaving the containment zone specifically so that they COULD be nuked or disposed of in some other way.

Gasp. They changed an ending? What about their artistic integrity!

So, like the Engineer decision on the SPECTRE terminal, blown to the game-size proportions? I've already said several times - if the game had fleet management at least a-la Evil Genius (or, if you prefer, Dune I) as an aside to the adventuring portion, it would'a been 20% more awesome and any and all failure would've lain firmly on Sheppy Shep's shoulders. He's gonna be a scapegoat (wrote spacegoat there originally, haha) anyway whatever the outcome. Might as well get the great power to justify the great responsibility.

Heaven forbid we use the warroom as an actual warroom right?
There could've been so many possibilities instead of just staring at an aribtrary list of numbers.

[Ieldra]

Elyiia wrote...

Ieldra2 wrote...

Nice, OP. I have once estimated the number of Reapers at about 4000. Not too different from yours, so I think we're in the plausible range. But I don't agree that a conventional victory should be possible against them. It took the whole quarian fleet to take out a Destroyer-class Reaper. It would be a war of attrition the Reapers would be bound to win.

No, it didn't. It took a small portion of the Quarian fleet. Look at the cutscene.

EDIT: And as I understand it, firing upon a target on the ground is far less effective due to the drag that occurs from the projectile entering the atmosphere.

Perhaps I should phrase this differently: The numbers and strengths of the Reapers and the allied fleets are undefined enough that you can justify either scenario if you want - a conventional defeat or no conventional defeat (though the latter would be a stretch), but I am firmly convinced that we should not be able to defeat the Reapers conventionally from a thematic and narrative viewpoint. The game tells us they are of  a kind that makes such a thing impossible, and I am in full agreement with that.

Modifié par Ieldra2, 30 avril 2012 - 02:05 .

[incinerator950]

Do take into account the Movie Effect op. Reapers dying on Screen for show effect, and in the codex to make up background. Paliven wasn't utterly swarmed like how the Humans lost Arcturus and nearly three fleets to just a dozen Capitals. Do not forget that the Hades Cannon equipped Destroyer (Speculation based off offsite ideas) did not have its Kinetic Barriers up.

The simple fact underlaying this is Reaper advancement goes when Bioware says it. It is not horribly thought out, it is not overly complex. It is so simple, you are overthinking it. You cannot defeat the Reapers conventionally because Bioware doesn't want them to be defeated conventionally. The sooner you can come to grips with that, the better you can move on to putting support into things that actually matter.

[JBPBRC]

What's this nonsense about a Quarian Fleet and whether or not it can destroy Reapers?

Best solution would've been to arm every ship with TONS of Cains, so we could have both Cains AND Fleets on hand to blast the Reapers into the next cycle.

I love smudboy's videos.

[Subject9x]

incinerator950 wrote...
The simple fact underlaying this is Reaper advancement goes when Bioware says it. It is not horribly thought out, it is not overly complex. It is so simple, you are overthinking it. You cannot defeat the Reapers conventionally because Bioware doesn't want them to be defeated conventionally. The sooner you can come to grips with that, the better you can move on to putting support into things that actually matter.

it all comes under: anything to put distance between the story, and the crucible...junk. Also, it's gamers on a forum, its going to be discussed anyway.

[Noelemahc]

Gasp. They changed an ending? What about their artistic integrity!

Their artistic integrity is that ALL of their games exist in one continuity. YES, with the widely insanely bizarrely different endings (although they sometimes accept an ending as canon if it affects a popular character's survival to the point where half the NPCs of the original Shin Megami Tensei have by now either starred in, or been a recruitable party member, or a boss, or some other person of note in a gaiden game). And that they should be (gasp) FUN. Yay.

Heaven forbid we use the warroom as an actual warroom right?
There could've been so many possibilities instead of just staring at an aribtrary list of numbers.

Hell yeah. When I first saw the war room, I thought "cool, Dune I, here we come!" because its war room was somewhat similar. And then... yeah, war assets, right. We can't even go do pep talks to those doctors that get shell shock when the PTSD asari kills herself, we can't talk to her (even though the effectively confesses to SHEPARD personally that she killed Joker's sister), we can't go thwap the idjits that let Rana Thanoptis kill so many VIPs, but we can traipse around the galaxy finding statues of naked chicks ("It's art if it's got an urn somewhere. And cherubs!" -- Discworld) and old religious texts instead. Yeah, we do drone work. Why not use agents instead? Those non-recruitable ME2 and ME1 characters that pledge allegiance to Shepardland? The promoted N7 MP characters? This could've been so AWESUM, the more you think about it... And yes, I realize I've just described the roadmap to turning Mass Effect into MGS Peace Walker. It's not a bad thing, accept it.

Dammit, now I feel like playing Evil Genius instead of working.

It is not horribly thought out, it is not overly complex. It is so simple, you are overthinking it. You cannot defeat the Reapers conventionally because Bioware doesn't want them to be defeated conventionally.

And therein lies the problem. They built this world with so much overengineering and overthinking BUILT INTO THE SETTING that it's impossible to not try to hyperanalize everything. There's a reason we feel betrayed by ME3, and not only the ending.

Modifié par Noelemahc, 30 avril 2012 - 02:15 .

[a.m.p]

incinerator950 wrote...
The simple fact underlaying this is Reaper advancement goes when Bioware says it. It is not horribly thought out, it is not overly complex. It is so simple, you are overthinking it. You cannot defeat the Reapers conventionally because Bioware doesn't want them to be defeated conventionally.

This is very true.
Bioware also, I assume does not want people to keep hating their ending.
So the thing is, adding one ending option to defeat reapers conventionally would fix lots of problems with the whole game for a significant amount of people. This thread is an attempt to show that it would not contradict anything except half a dozen lines for Hackett, who is not infallible in his judgement. I am saying that should Bioware decide that we are after all allowed to win they don't even need to retcon anything.

[Elyiia]

Ieldra2 wrote...

Elyiia wrote...

Ieldra2 wrote...

Nice, OP. I have once estimated the number of Reapers at about 4000. Not too different from yours, so I think we're in the plausible range. But I don't agree that a conventional victory should be possible against them. It took the whole quarian fleet to take out a Destroyer-class Reaper. It would be a war of attrition the Reapers would be bound to win.

No, it didn't. It took a small portion of the Quarian fleet. Look at the cutscene.

EDIT: And as I understand it, firing upon a target on the ground is far less effective due to the drag that occurs from the projectile entering the atmosphere.

Perhaps I should phrase this differently: The numbers and strengths of the Reapers and the allied fleets are undefined enough that you can justify either scenario if you want - a conventional defeat or no conventional defeat (though the latter would be a stretch), but I am firmly convinced that we should not be able to defeat the Reapers conventionally from a thematic and narrative viewpoint. The game tells us they are of  a kind that makes such a thing impossible, and I am in full agreement with that.

The game also tells us everything we have done prior to ME3 is impossible, but because it's Shepard she does it anyway.

I think a conventional victory would have been a far better option than the superweapon we just happened to discover in an information cache that we had access to for decades.

[incinerator950]

Subject9x wrote...

incinerator950 wrote...
The simple fact underlaying this is Reaper advancement goes when Bioware says it. It is not horribly thought out, it is not overly complex. It is so simple, you are overthinking it. You cannot defeat the Reapers conventionally because Bioware doesn't want them to be defeated conventionally. The sooner you can come to grips with that, the better you can move on to putting support into things that actually matter.

it all comes under: anything to put distance between the story, and the crucible...junk. Also, it's gamers on a forum, its going to be discussed anyway.

It is, and even though I know its a waste of time, I can go put on my old Uniform and play Armchair sailor with the rest of you.  However, when people are struggling to grasp the basic concept of an enemy's plans that was not shown to have proper direction for obvious reasons, it becomes almost insulting to watch people squirm around here, hoping that light will pierce the clouds for you.  

Which before anyone asks, while I tolerate the endings, the Crucible was indeed a bad plot device.