225 réponses à ce sujet

[OdanUrr]

Aaleel wrote...

It doesn't bother me because there would have been no game if the reapers used sound strategy,

Of course they should have taken the Citadel first, closed the relays and then systematically harvested each system in any order they saw fit.

But if they did it, Shepard would have been stuck in the Sol system waiting for Humanity's turn, and what kind of game would that have been.

Then you have the first hard choice of the entire war effort: destroy the Citadel before it can be used against you or choose to defend it with countless fleets.

[AlexXIV]

OdanUrr wrote...

Abreu Road wrote...

This is the kind of plot hole that doesn't bother me in a story. It's like saying "why did not the Fellowship rode the big eagles and dropped the One Ring in Mount Doom?". If you think in that way, the movie will have 10 minutes or the book 100 pages. This is the same thing as Reapers attacking Earth, and all of sudden, Earth turns out to be the most important place in the entire galaxy even for people who never gave a **** for it.

This is a fundamental part of storytelling. It's only an (I really hate to use this word here) artistic choice and necessary for a story to evolve. I can deal with that. What I can't deal is 10 minutes of cluster****ing plotholes courtesy of Mr. Lot's of Speculation. THIS is plain stuppidity.

No, we need to be consistent here. If we don't like the endings because they don't make sense, for whatever reason, then the same applies to the fact that the Reapers do not attempt to follow through on their plan of shutting down the relays and picking their enemies off one system at a time. The Reapers created the Citadel, they created the relays, they most definitely could have shut down the relay network if they had put their minds to it. They didn't, and that doesn't make sense.

Honestly, I said here right in this thread how stupid I think it is. Well Sovereign was stupid to begin with, but without him being stupid there would not have been a good ending to ME1. However, the endings are about 100x worse than any other plothole in the franchise. I can deal with dispension of disbelieve to a certain point. But if the ending plain sucks from A to Z it is an issue that I just cannot overlook. There are many angles you can look at the ending. Philosophical, artistic, technical, storywise. And they all suck. That's a marvellous accomplishment, should have had an achievemant for that.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Look if they gave single reaper destroyers godlike powers, and made everyone else with room temperature IQs I think it's only fair that the Reapers suffer the same fate once in a while. We'll call it "****** Syndrome." It is highly contagious.

[Abreu Road]

OdanUrr wrote...

Abreu Road wrote...

This is the kind of plot hole that doesn't bother me in a story. It's like saying "why did not the Fellowship rode the big eagles and dropped the One Ring in Mount Doom?". If you think in that way, the movie will have 10 minutes or the book 100 pages. This is the same thing as Reapers attacking Earth, and all of sudden, Earth turns out to be the most important place in the entire galaxy even for people who never gave a **** for it.

This is a fundamental part of storytelling. It's only an (I really hate to use this word here) artistic choice and necessary for a story to evolve. I can deal with that. What I can't deal is 10 minutes of cluster****ing plotholes courtesy of Mr. Lot's of Speculation. THIS is plain stuppidity.

No, we need to be consistent here. If we don't like the endings because they don't make sense, for whatever reason, then the same applies to the fact that the Reapers do not attempt to follow through on their plan of shutting down the relays and picking their enemies off one system at a time. The Reapers created the Citadel, they created the relays, they most definitely could have shut down the relay network if they had put their minds to it. They didn't, and that doesn't make sense.

If they shut down the relay network (which I agree to you, was the most logical thing to do), we will not be able to rally all races and things like that. We would need to use conventional FTL which would take generations to reach the quarians, for example. The game and the story will be ****ed up right at the beginning.

This is one of those things that are excusable on movies/games/books. Enemies have to be a little stupid for the hero to stand a chance.

If you start thinking logical with fiction and stories, you will eventually be disappointed with the huge amount of stupidity you will find on them. Sovereign could have just take the Normandy down alone right after Feros or Virmire and Saren's problems would end. Harbinger could have send the collector's ship to chase the Normandy again at any point of ME2. You have to close your eyes and accept absurdity to enjoy this kind of story.

But, I say again, this doensn't make the cluster**** ending acceptable. One thing is a stupid villain who can't plan a good strategy. Other thing is to make you, the player, and your character, a complete retarded, which is basically what Shepard becomes every time he/she steps on Earth.

[Aaleel]

OdanUrr wrote...

Aaleel wrote...

It doesn't bother me because there would have been no game if the reapers used sound strategy,

Of course they should have taken the Citadel first, closed the relays and then systematically harvested each system in any order they saw fit.

But if they did it, Shepard would have been stuck in the Sol system waiting for Humanity's turn, and what kind of game would that have been.

Then you have the first hard choice of the entire war effort: destroy the Citadel before it can be used against you or choose to defend it with countless fleets.

You're under house arrest.   By the time Shepard even knew what was going on the relays would have been shut down.  Look how quickly the Reapers took the Citadel before they moved it to Earth.  It just appeared, no one even got as much as a distress signal to let you know what was going on.

Also, if you destroyed the Citadel, you could have never had the whole Crucible storyline, which may not have been particularly bad, but I digress.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

OdanUrr wrote...

Aaleel wrote...

It doesn't bother me because there would have been no game if the reapers used sound strategy,

Of course they should have taken the Citadel first, closed the relays and then systematically harvested each system in any order they saw fit.

But if they did it, Shepard would have been stuck in the Sol system waiting for Humanity's turn, and what kind of game would that have been.

Then you have the first hard choice of the entire war effort: destroy the Citadel before it can be used against you or choose to defend it with countless fleets.

Now, that's a good choice. Blow up the Citadel. It's a mass relay itself, and a big one. And it contains Starbrat who controls the reapers. And they make reapers in it. And it houses dumbasses. Kill four birds with one stone. It'll probably take out the cluster. Plant four nukes 10 MT ea in the inner part of the ring and blow the ****er to hell. And you'll take out that second relay as well.

[OdanUrr]

Abreu Road wrote...

If they shut down the relay network (which I agree to you, was the most logical thing to do), we will not be able to rally all races and things like that. We would need to use conventional FTL which would take generations to reach the quarians, for example. The game and the story will be ****ed up right at the beginning.

This is one of those things that are excusable on movies/games/books. Enemies have to be a little stupid for the hero to stand a chance.

If you start thinking logical with fiction and stories, you will eventually be disappointed with the huge amount of stupidity you will find on them. Sovereign could have just take the Normandy down alone right after Feros or Virmire and Saren's problems would end. Harbinger could have send the collector's ship to chase the Normandy again at any point of ME2. You have to close your eyes and accept absurdity to enjoy this kind of story.

But, I say again, this doensn't make the cluster**** ending acceptable. One thing is a stupid villain who can't plan a good strategy. Other thing is to make you, the player, and your character, a complete retarded, which is basically what Shepard becomes every time he/she steps on Earth.

What I'm saying is they should've acknowledged the issue and provided an explanation for why the Reapers didn't do the most sensible thing they could ever have done.

I don't quite agree with the underlined. The same thing happened in "Rule of Two" but reversed: the good guys were made stupid so the bad guys could win. That's downright awful. If you want the bad guys to win, do it smartly, do not diminish their enemies. Same thing applies to the good guys.

[Evo_9]

Isnt the citadel indestructible when its closed?

How can the reapers simply "take it back" when the keepers arent responding and we dont know for sure that the catalyst has the ability to control the citadel's functions.

Would be pointless for the reapers to try and control the citadel

Modifié par Evo_9, 03 mai 2012 - 11:21 .

[Evo_9]

.

Modifié par Evo_9, 03 mai 2012 - 11:21 .

[Aaleel]

Evo_9 wrote...

Isnt the citadel indestructible when its closed?
How can the reapers simply "take it back" when the keepers arent responding and we dont know for sure that the catalyst has the ability to control the citadel's functions.
Would be pointless for the reapers to try and control the citadel

They did it pretty easily at the end of the game, and that was during war time.  Imagine how easy it would have been to take it if they just attacked out of the blue.

[OdanUrr]

Aaleel wrote...

You're under house arrest.

This is also plain old stupid. The Reapers are coming and Shepard turns himself in. What has that accomplished? Nothing!! Absolutely nothing!! It just provides an excuse to show Earth being attacked by the Reapers at the beginning of the game, but it makes no sense.

Aaleel wrote...

By the time Shepard even knew what was going on the relays would have been shut down.  Look how quickly the Reapers took the Citadel before they moved it to Earth.  It just appeared, no one even got as much as a distress signal to let you know what was going on.

Shepard has known of the danger the Citadel poses since the end of ME1, he didn't have to wait for the Reapers to show up. Of course, there's this small problem that nobody believes him, but that also raises the question of why he didn't try to gather evidence to prove the Reapers' existence. Surely, he gathers a ton of evidence in ME2. His time after Arrival could have been better spent presenting this evidence to the Council and, at the very least, reaching a compromise to move the Citadel to an undisclosed location. How? Tug it.

Aaleel wrote...

Also, if you destroyed the Citadel, you could have never had the whole Crucible storyline, which may not have been particularly bad, but I digress.

Correct. The Crucible could still exist but it would have to work differently.

[ShaneP]

I never got how the sabotage of the Citadel wasn't detected either being that it's part of the catalyst. I hope Bioware explains this rather big plot hole in EC because as it is the only plausible answer I can come up with is that the catalyst detached itself from the Citadel's systems to prevent it's true nature from being discovered and revealed, but that's just guesswork at this juncture. It's also interesting to note that the catalyst and the reapers, despite being machines driven by logic didn't account for the possibility that the citadel's signal may be corrupted and put a contingency in place.

[Evo_9]

Aaleel wrote...

Evo_9 wrote...

Isnt the citadel indestructible when its closed?
How can the reapers simply "take it back" when the keepers arent responding and we dont know for sure that the catalyst has the ability to control the citadel's functions.
Would be pointless for the reapers to try and control the citadel

They did it pretty easily at the end of the game, and that was during war time.  Imagine how easy it would have been to take it if they just attacked out of the blue.

Yes but wasnt that only because the citadel had to remain open for the cruicble to function? 

otherwise it could remain closed but organics have no weapon

[Anacronian Stryx]

It's actually pretty easy to construct a plot where the reapers main goal is the citadel but the council races are able to prevent that .. though it would require Bioware to remember what happened in the two earlier games and that might be a bit to much to ask for.

Take two things that happened in ME 1-2 and implement them -The Citadel master control unit and the reaper IFF, Have the council races reverse engineer the reaper IFF and by doing that have them gain the ability to do exactly what the reapers usually do restrict access to the relay network..but this time it works in reverse so the reapers are restricted and implement that though the citadel master control unit.. even though said unit was completely forgotten after shep used it to let the fifth fleet though the citadel relay.

At some point the Cerberus(on behest of their reaper masters) attacks the citadel and for short period of time gain access to the master control unit allowing the reapers usage of the relay network allowing them to spill into the galaxy proper(naturally shep and co retake the MCU before the reapers reach the citadel).

[PsyrenY]

The Angry One wrote...

Are the Reapers here to harvest efficiently or be supervillains?

That word "efficiently" is your own addition. I would argue that the most efficient thing to do would be to collect {race} until you have enough for a Reaper then glass every other world from orbit. Instead they do things like concentration camps and inviting world leaders into their superstructures to then enact legislation to not harm Reapers so that they can bring in more of their kind to be indoctrinated who will then...

Harvesting may be their goal, but "efficiently?" I'd say not.

AlexXIV wrote...

And I guess after Shepard has prevented all their attempts they had reason enough to be super arrogant and drop a tactic they used ever since?

The sabotage in ME1? Do we know exactly what it did?
This is too easy to handwave to lose sleep over.

[Anacronian Stryx]

The Angry One wrote...

Are the Reapers here to harvest efficiently or be supervillains?

Apparently they are here to be the big bad buggy men for 99% of the series only to be turned into tools in the last 1%.

[Oldbones2]

Prosarian wrote...

Why didn't the Reapers just claim the citadel at the start of the game?

Just made this thread in the hope that someone might have found something in the game to explain that. It's really been bugging me cos it makes the Reapers seem like idiots and it makes the rest of the plot feel ridiculous.

Why bother, its well defended (which ties up valuable resources that could be fighting Reapers elsewhere) and because of the code inserted in ME1, can no longer shut down relays remotely.

Simply put, there is no REASON to take it out first anymore, and one good reason to leave it alone.

[phagus]

Lethys1 wrote...

The real plot hole is why the Milky Way Galaxy's inhabitants would choose to build the Crucible such that it only operates with the power of the Citadel, despite the fact that every cycle starts with Reapers controlling it to start with.

The Reapers are a bit too conveniently weak or dumb in certain specific ways to truly convince me that even the Protheans would have difficulty defeating them.

Thanks another massive plothole to add to my list!.. So in order for the crucible to work for the next cycle it has to be deployed before the Reapers come through the Citadel's relay and kill everyone...Mmm let me think..if deployed before the Reapers arrive it would have to be activated when they arrive otherwise how would its space magic work on them out in dark space? Now if a relay needs to be in a pair to work then the citadels companion must be in dark space..so that might work..does this plug the hole?  Not sure.
 
The ending does reduce the unknowable, mighty and menacing Reapers into clueless tools of the Catalyst. Tools that have no say in what happens to them when Shep chooses, just like the rest of the galaxy I guess. I think I'm starting to feel sorry for them is that wrong?

Modifié par phagus, 04 mai 2012 - 08:57 .

[Aaleel]

Lethys1 wrote...

The real plot hole is why the Milky Way Galaxy's inhabitants would choose to build the Crucible such that it only operates with the power of the Citadel, despite the fact that every cycle starts with Reapers controlling it to start with.

The Reapers are a bit too conveniently weak or dumb in certain specific ways to truly convince me that even the Protheans would have difficulty defeating them.

Well the Crucible started out as an independent weapon, and it was decided that it wasn't strong enough on it's own, so they made it work with the Citadel to give it more juice.   Maybe they thought in the next cycle they would protect the Citadel and use it.

But then again, if that's the case.  The catalyst being presnt in the cycles where they hadn't adapted it to work with makes no sense.

[matthewmi]

Because if they took over the citadel immediately it would have made for a boring game.

[humes spork]

The Angry One wrote...

So they're occupying the homeworlds of 3 out of 4 of the Council member species and nobody cares?
Uh..

Ugh, you are either not understanding this at a fundamental level, or just ignoring arguments to push your own narrative.

The Reapers need ground forces to assault homeworlds, subdue and control those homeworlds' populaces and to serve as the manual labor and suppression force to initiate and maintain the harvest. Otherwise it's a bunch of two-kilometer-tall robots stomping around shooting things with lasers while the natives run around in circles, anywhere but inside the harvest ships where they need to eventually go.

The Citadel only has 13.2 million inhabitants. They're not going to get enough ground forces -- assuming they can capture it with zero loss of life and immediately turn that populace into ground forces -- to wage a war against some colony worlds let alone a homeworld.

The batarian hegemony's leadership is already indoctrinated. Easy conquest, easy source of ground troops, the closest place to arrive as you yourself put it. Meanwhile, the rest of the galaxy is already divided and in a careful balance of power among among powers that have varying levels of tension between one another. The best way to use that to your advantage is to divide and conquer. Humanity is the odd man out, distrusted and with elevated tensions with the other races, and is next door to the batarians.

Moreover, the rest of the galaxy has Reaper IFF's which would potentially give it the same free reign of the relay network as the Reapers have, has military technology reverse-engineered from Reapers, communications devices independent from the relay network, and most importantly the industrial capacity to put those advantages to immediate use. The turians for the navy they already had successfully held their mass relay, until overwhelmed by sheer force of numbers. Now, imagine if an entire galaxy due to a singular catalyzing event switched to a war economy; for what we know about the galaxy, its industrial-scale production methods, and its production capacity its military strength could increase by orders of magnitude in a matter of months.

Unless the Reapers destroy that production capacity by attacking homeworlds and colonies piecemeal and before the galactic community recognizes the scope and scale of the threat and responds accordingly, they're asking for serious trouble. What is guaranteed by assaulting the Citadel too early is to drive that reality home to the organic civilizations very quickly.

Remember what happened after the Cerberus coup? The asari and salarians, who up to this point had been equivocating, joined the humans', turians' and krogans' war effort in earnest. The Cerberus coup was that catalysis for unification, and that wasn't even direct Reaper action! ...and what were the Reapers doing in the meantime? dismantling the organic races' capability to sustain a war economy.

It's logistics. Logistics, logistics, logistics.

[Shaoken]

According to Weekes Vigil's virus corrupted the Citadel's ability to shut off the relay network, devaluing it's tactical worth. So they left it because it was a place that refugees would flee to and a communications hub. All they had to do was have a few indoctrinated agents onboard reporting back and they could catch wind if the organics were trying something different.

As for why star child didn't do anything himself, I got the impression from my first meeting with him that he was very passive, and saw direct control of things as an admission that his solution wasn't so great after all. So he took the parts of his brain about assuming direct control and gave them to Harbinger.

[Anacronian Stryx]

Shaoken wrote...

According to Weekes Vigil's virus corrupted the Citadel's ability to shut off the relay network, devaluing it's tactical worth. So they left it because it was a place that refugees would flee to and a communications hub. All they had to do was have a few indoctrinated agents onboard reporting back and they could catch wind if the organics were trying something different.

.

Then what the hell was Sovereign trying to do, And really we see Saren use the MCU to shut down the relays around the citadel and this happened after the protheons used the virus.

[The Angry One]

humes spork wrote...

Ugh, you are either not understanding this at a fundamental level, or just ignoring arguments to push your own narrative.

You're ignoring my point because it doesn't suit you.

The Reapers need ground forces to assault homeworlds, subdue and control those homeworlds' populaces and to serve as the manual labor and suppression force to initiate and maintain the harvest. Otherwise it's a bunch of two-kilometer-tall robots stomping around shooting things with lasers while the natives run around in circles, anywhere but inside the harvest ships where they need to eventually go.

It's called fast track indoctrination.

The Citadel only has 13.2 million inhabitants. They're not going to get enough ground forces -- assuming they can capture it with zero loss of life and immediately turn that populace into ground forces -- to wage a war against some colony worlds let alone a homeworld.

Irrelevant. They still require the Citadel.

The batarian hegemony's leadership is already indoctrinated. Easy conquest, easy source of ground troops, the closest place to arrive as you yourself put it. Meanwhile, the rest of the galaxy is already divided and in a careful balance of power among among powers that have varying levels of tension between one another. The best way to use that to your advantage is to divide and conquer. Humanity is the odd man out, distrusted and with elevated tensions with the other races, and is next door to the batarians.

THEY WERE ATTACKING PALAVEN TOO.

Moreover, the rest of the galaxy has Reaper IFF's which would potentially give it the same free reign of the relay network as the Reapers have,

Reaper IFFs make sure the Omega-4 relay corrects drift when exiting to it's sister relay.
THAT'S ALL IT DOES.

has military technology reverse-engineered from Reapers, communications devices independent from the relay network, and most importantly the industrial capacity to put those advantages to immediate use. The turians for the navy they already had successfully held their mass relay, until overwhelmed by sheer force of numbers. Now, imagine if an entire galaxy due to a singular catalyzing event switched to a war economy; for what we know about the galaxy, its industrial-scale production methods, and its production capacity its military strength could increase by orders of magnitude in a matter of months.

So Earth and Palaven being invaded is not a catalyzing event.

Unless the Reapers destroy that production capacity by attacking homeworlds and colonies piecemeal and before the galactic community recognizes the scope and scale of the threat and responds accordingly, they're asking for serious trouble. What is guaranteed by assaulting the Citadel too early is to drive that reality home to the organic civilizations very quickly.

Except with the Citadel, you get rid of the Council, the leadership of the galaxy and control the relay network.
Again, they were occupying Earth and Palaven, later Thessia, and harassing Sur'Kesh.
BUT NOBODY IS GOING TO CARE. Seriously, what the hell?

Remember what happened after the Cerberus coup? The asari and salarians, who up to this point had been equivocating, joined the humans', turians' and krogans' war effort in earnest. The Cerberus coup was that catalysis for unification, and that wasn't even direct Reaper action! ...and what were the Reapers doing in the meantime? dismantling the organic races' capability to sustain a war economy.

It's logistics. Logistics, logistics, logistics.

Yeah, and guess who were organising that.
The Asari and Salarian Councilors, the people they would kill if they took the Citadel.

It's called tactics, and even if you were somehow right. Answer me this. Why didn't they take the Citadel directly after the Cerberus coup? Why continue to faff about?

Modifié par The Angry One, 04 mai 2012 - 12:19 .

[111987]

Anacronian Stryx wrote...

Shaoken wrote...

According to Weekes Vigil's virus corrupted the Citadel's ability to shut off the relay network, devaluing it's tactical worth. So they left it because it was a place that refugees would flee to and a communications hub. All they had to do was have a few indoctrinated agents onboard reporting back and they could catch wind if the organics were trying something different.

.

Then what the hell was Sovereign trying to do, And really we see Saren use the MCU to shut down the relays around the citadel and this happened after the protheons used the virus.

Vigil's data file was used after Saren locked down the Relays.