77 réponses à ce sujet

[Shallyah]

He wakes up and fires the Crucible. We win.

[matt-bassist]

Vox Draco wrote...


1. Just imagine an incredible wake-up cutscene showing Joker crash-landing the Normandy into Harbinger or any other Reaper nearby to get rid of this problem. All the while the remains of the allied forces, including surviving squadmates and war-assets like, for example Wrex and his Krogans or Jack and her biotics, are rushing to secure Shepards body, fighting and sacrificing themselves to make sure the hero that made everything possible might survive. It could be an incredibly strong and emotional scene, showing how all the races allied with each other due to Shepard's efforts fight together to make her safe...

i just came a little

[Swimming Ferret]

I don't get it; if you wake up after the 'breathe scene' after choosing Destroy then the Reapers are all still alive and Shepard failed and everyone gets eaten. Seems to suck as bad as the current end.

[DJBare]

A likely scenario is the Normandy giving cover fire while the squad rescues Shepard and moves to a relatively safe location, then a shuttle picks them all up and returns to the Normandy and makes a quick getaway entering stealth mode, I figure Shepard will be in the medical bay for a few days.

[Vox Draco]

matt-bassist wrote...

Vox Draco wrote...


1. Just imagine an incredible wake-up cutscene showing Joker crash-landing the Normandy into Harbinger or any other Reaper nearby to get rid of this problem. All the while the remains of the allied forces, including surviving squadmates and war-assets like, for example Wrex and his Krogans or Jack and her biotics, are rushing to secure Shepards body, fighting and sacrificing themselves to make sure the hero that made everything possible might survive. It could be an incredibly strong and emotional scene, showing how all the races allied with each other due to Shepard's efforts fight together to make her safe...

i just came a little

ahem...not sure if I want to have this effect on BSN-Users...but hey...to make your dream a little wetter try
to imagine suc ha scenario to this music here

[nightcobra]

snip

Modifié par nightcobra8928, 02 juin 2012 - 08:41 .

[Aaleel]

I don't see any way to win that would make sense.

Even if I ignore the fact that Harbinger never flew away and is standing over Shepard, who is buried under slabs of concrete and wire.

The reapers would just cut off the beam so Shepard can't get to the citadel, and moreso just destroy the crucible, if they hadn't already done so. I would have if I were Harbinger, Shepard is already knocked out, how would Shepard know, and that way whether Shepard is indoctrinated or not, you win.

Hammer and Sword are being taken out the whole time, there is no escaping and coming back later to win, you won't have the strength or arms to win at a future date.  Shepard has to use the crucible right then and there. 

Any ending that would have Shepard being pulled from the rubble, limping to a beam (that for whatever insane reason is still on for Shepard to use), getting on the Citadel, and using the Crucible before the reapers destroy it would be as nonsensical as what we got originally.

Modifié par Aaleel, 02 juin 2012 - 12:16 .

[AxeloftheKey]

You say the Normandy would swoop in and save the day...Sure...
Except there's gonna be multiple Reapers. I already explained that.
If Shepard is unconscious, the SECOND he breaks indoctrination, they're gonna shoot him. They are completely aware and capable of doing this.

You all have awesome-sounding headcanon. Except it's dumb. And it doesn't add-up. And it creates as many plotholes as you all see in the current ending.

[dreamgazer]

AxeloftheKey wrote...

You say the Normandy would swoop in and save the day...Sure...
Except there's gonna be multiple Reapers. I already explained that.
If Shepard is unconscious, the SECOND he breaks indoctrination, they're gonna shoot him. They are completely aware and capable of doing this.

I dunno, I did a pretty bang-up job of dodging Reaper fire on Rannoch, and Joker ain't no slouch behind the wheel. 

[AxeloftheKey]

Right, because when you wake up you aren't super-charred, wounded, and lying in a pile of London rubble after the Destroy ending...Oh, wait, yes you are.

You also see Shepard take a breath, not wake up, so he might still be unconscious, just thwarting indoctrination. Again, if that's the case, once they see Shepard can't be swayed to their side, they will logically kill him. Reapers have to be relatively close to Indoctrinate him, they can't do that from far away, otherwise everyone on Earth fighting against them could've been indoctrinated from afar. If IT is going based on all of this evidence, and using the game itself as back-up, then your war assets aren't nearby, no one will know you're still alive...Joker can ram about ONE Reaper before completely blowing up the Normandy, and we've seen it takes a fleet to take out one...How about the several Harbinger-class Reapers that were headed for the Conduit?

I'm just saying that by simple logic, you haven't improved anything.

[Vox Draco]

AxeloftheKey wrote...

You say the Normandy would swoop in and save the day...Sure...
Except there's gonna be multiple Reapers. I already explained that.
If Shepard is unconscious, the SECOND he breaks indoctrination, they're gonna shoot him. They are completely aware and capable of doing this.

You all have awesome-sounding headcanon. Except it's dumb. And it doesn't add-up. And it creates as many plotholes as you all see in the current ending.

*sigh* All that you explained is your own headcanon, as we hardly have any idea how the situation all around shepard is at the moment she wakes up. You are assuming many things as well.

And for the plothole-stuff: No, the reapers would never shoot Shepard to death the moment she wakes up...why? I'll give you the easiest and cheapest answer available: Because the story would be over then. There is ALWAYS a way you can continue from such a situation, always. And the more emotional, the more dramatic, the more breathetaking you realize such an escape...barely no one will ever ask if it was achieved by using a plothole.

In fact, that whole plothole-stuff is totally overrated and only a direct result of the weak and very anti-climatic endings anyway. With a proper and maybe conventional happy ending (as one of many endings of course) hardly anyone but the die-hard fans would have bother about "plotholes"in ME3...You tend to ignore it if the story as a whole satisfies you emotionally. almost every big story/movie could be here and there accused of plotholes...

I understand that you want to undermine the IT, but it is bioware's story. If they decided/decide to continue from shepard's breathe onwards, they would find a way to do this, and to justify this. And if they have to shout "the eagles! The eagles are coming!", then well, I won't complain... 

[Versidious]

Vox Draco wrote...

Eryri wrote...Absolutely!  This is the exact same thing that I've been head-cannoning to improve the ending. I can envisage a fantastic solo battle between Shepard and some sort of Harbinger avatar within a nightmarish landscape inside Shepard's mind. Maybe the forest from Shepard's dreams? Harbinger could take the form of a "mirror image" Shepard with Shepard's powers and abilities. Shep and Harby could be chasing each other through the trees, ambushing and sniping at each other. It could be absolutely awesome, and a welcome change of environment from the usual spaceship / urban battlefields in the rest of the game. At the conclusion of the fight, when Shep satisfyingly dispatches Harbinger, he or she would wake up to find the real Harbinger disoriented and vulnerable al la Sovereign in ME1.

I posted this idea here about a week ago in the IT Mark II thread, but I really love the idea and want more people to see it, because it really, really "proves" that It could lead to awesome ways to exapnd the story...


Shepard chooses destroy, but I always thought just waking up is rather...lame. I would prefer Shepard to really fight her way out of Harbinger's grip. So after you blew up the tube and made the first step in denying the Reaper's logic and right to exist...you "awake" in one of the these three locations...

1. Colony of Mindoir, just under attack by Batarian Slavers
2. A slum-district in an unknown Mega-City on Earth, ruled by crime and gangs
3. An Alliance Spaceship or Spacestation

I hope you see where I am heading...the next step of Shepard's fight is still inside her head, and leads her to her past. Not the real past though, a twisted, nightmarish version, influenced by the Reapers and Harbinger, who try to lure you away from your path, despair you, use your fears against you. This part would mostly be dialouge, evading combat, or based on renegade/paragon-interrupts etc. You are still a teenager and not a supersoldier after all. The next phase would lead us to more real combat though:

1: Akuze, where you fight actively against hordes of Thresher-Maws and see your whole squad dying
2. Torfan, where you sacrifice your entire team to get the job done and kill all Batarians
3. The Battle of the Skyllian Bliz, where you fight against an army of pirates to save the city

Again, everything here would be twisted and altered, maybe enemies with huskified appearance, and surreal elements. Harbinger would always accompany us like in ME2, mocking us, trying to deceive us to make different choices and leave the path of truth. I would love to see a "nightmarish" version of Hannah Shepard...

The final chapter could be all the same for everyone, and feature an important mission from ME1, maybe Virmire, though totally different this time...like forcing you to sacrifice your current LI no matter what (even if he/she wasn't present then, its a dream, so many possibilites)...

I don't like your awakening idea, but this is pretty cool. I've been thinking recently how amazing it would be to have a flashback to Akuze/Torfan/Elysium.

[comrade gando]

if you picked red your team helps you to your feet, maybe your LI would be nice. if you picked blue or green you wake up and start capping your teammates with glowing blue eyes idk

[Helmschmied]

He wakes up, stumbles into the conduit, activates the Crucible and the Reapers are destroyed.
Bäm. Winning.

[Eryri]

AxeloftheKey wrote...

You say the Normandy would swoop in and save the day...Sure...
Except there's gonna be multiple Reapers. I already explained that.
If Shepard is unconscious, the SECOND he breaks indoctrination, they're gonna shoot him. They are completely aware and capable of doing this.

You all have awesome-sounding headcanon. Except it's dumb. And it doesn't add-up. And it creates as many plotholes as you all see in the current ending.

I did actually head-canon a way around this in my own daft little fan fic -  http://social.biowar...13/272#11924561 

We know from the codex that Harbinger is the oldest and largest reaper, so it's not too much of a stretch to imagine that he might be the original reaper and founder of the reaper race. He was the reaper supervising the Collectors while they built the human reaper after all.

As such, he wouldn't be too keen on the idea of his creations rising up and usurping him, so he would program them to defer to him at all times, a permanent form of indoctrination. If Shepard did manage to fight him off in the sort of mental battle that Vox Draco described, then that might conceivably disrupt Harbinger's control of all his minions.

All the reapers could experience free will for the first time in their lives. Being machines and able to think fast, they would quickly make individual decisions to either continue siding with Harbinger, disappear off into dark space, or take revenge on the s.o.b who mentaly dominated them for the past million years.

With civil war breaking out among the reapers, the Alliance would have a chance for a conventional victory, without using the Crucible at all - which anyway always seemed a daft McGuffin to me. Everybody dropping everything to build a machine with no idea what it does or how it does it? And making incremental improvements to these incomprehensible plans which just happen to survive every cycle? It always sounded more like a reaper trap to get the alliance to waste time and resources.

While Shepard and Harbinger are recovering from their mental battle, the rebel reapers could swoop in and fire on Harbinger - the created turning on their creator indeed! 

Afterward the surviving reapers would fly off to pursue their own mysterious goals. Alive but relatively benign, to be a dark legend lurking in the depths of space for future games. Happy endings for Shepard and the surviving crew.

Is my head canon a bit contrived and convenient? Yes. But I don't think it's any worse than what we got.

Edited for spelling

Modifié par Eryri, 02 juin 2012 - 04:38 .

[AxeloftheKey]

That's interesting, I'm just going off of entirely what was said by people. Whoever said it was "my head-canon" missed the part where I only brought up stuff shown/said in-game.

Hackett says multiple Reapers are coming.
We see Shepard lying in rubble.
During the entire final fight before launching the missiles, there was no one to come to help us. A large number of the soldiers that could are eviscerated by Harby's laser.

I understand that it would be anti-climactic if Harby immediately shot Shepard, but if he doesn't, we wind up with an ending that seems just as contrived as the one we got. An ending where the war assets suddenly show up? Where the Normandy can suddenly stand its own against multiple reapers? Why the goal of killing Shepard as quickly as possible that has been maintained in every mission of the game against every enemy we fought is suddenly being eschewed?

You guys have awesome head-canon, props to you especially, Eryri. But that doesn't add-up to what we're shown in the game. IT says that Shepard is being indoctrinated while lying their on the ground after getting shot. Some people think it's when he goes to the Citadel, and that's a different argument. But a lot of you think he never made it. If that's the case, if that's what you believe, you're setting yourself up for a lame awakening that will either suck, or be really contrived and not make any sense why the Reapers didn't just kill Shepard.

[Eryri]

AxeloftheKey wrote...
edit

You guys have awesome head-canon, props to you especially, Eryri. But that doesn't add-up to what we're shown in the game. IT says that Shepard is being indoctrinated while lying their on the ground after getting shot. Some people think it's when he goes to the Citadel, and that's a different argument. But a lot of you think he never made it. If that's the case, if that's what you believe, you're setting yourself up for a lame awakening that will either suck, or be really contrived and not make any sense why the Reapers didn't just kill Shepard.

Thanks Axel. As you may have guessed I've put WAY more thought than is healthy into mentally retconning the ending. 

Don't worry - I realise that there's no firm proof for the IT either way. It may be nothing like what Bioware intended for the franchise. These posts are just my way of saying to Bioware that if the Indoc Theory was the direction they planned to go with the Extended cut - I for one would be delighted. I would even forgive them for the past three months of video game related depression.

Regarding the reapers mysteriously failing to kill Shepard - you may remember that among Harbinger's lines in ME2 he would sometimes say "preserve Shepard's body if possible". Personally I think he's planning to use Shep as the core of a new human reaper. Either that or he just wants to sadistically prolong Shepard's agony by making him / her watch as the rest of the human race is destroyed. Just my 2 cents anyway.

Modifié par Eryri, 02 juin 2012 - 05:39 .

[AxeloftheKey]

I just figured Harby wanted him for the human reaper in ME2. Now that it's gone, he has no reason to keep you around anymore.

I dunno. IT has just failed to make a more compelling ending. The evidence is there, certainly, but I also feel that sometimes, the plotholes aren't as extensive as people assume.

[Leafs43]

AxeloftheKey wrote...

I just figured Harby wanted him for the human reaper in ME2. Now that it's gone, he has no reason to keep you around anymore.

I dunno. IT has just failed to make a more compelling ending. The evidence is there, certainly, but I also feel that sometimes, the plotholes aren't as extensive as people assume.

Reapers are harvesting humans. 


It's assumed they are making another human reaper.

[AxeloftheKey]

They're harvesting everyone.
No reason to keep Shepard alive over anyone else, especially if he can't be indoctrinated.

[Vox Draco]

AxeloftheKey wrote...

1. That's interesting, I'm just going off of entirely what was said by people. Whoever said it was "my head-canon" missed the part where I only brought up stuff shown/said in-game.

2. Hackett says multiple Reapers are coming.
We see Shepard lying in rubble.
During the entire final fight before launching the missiles, there was no one to come to help us. A large number of the soldiers that could are eviscerated by Harby's laser.

3. I understand that it would be anti-climactic if Harby immediately shot Shepard, but if he doesn't, we wind up with an ending that seems just as contrived as the one we got. An ending where the war assets suddenly show up? Where the Normandy can suddenly stand its own against multiple reapers? Why the goal of killing Shepard as quickly as possible that has been maintained in every mission of the game against every enemy we fought is suddenly being eschewed?

4. You guys have awesome head-canon, props to you especially, Eryri. But that doesn't add-up to what we're shown in the game. IT says that Shepard is being indoctrinated while lying their on the ground after getting shot. Some people think it's when he goes to the Citadel, and that's a different argument. But a lot of you think he never made it. If that's the case, if that's what you believe, you're setting yourself up for a lame awakening that will either suck, or be really contrived and not make any sense why the Reapers didn't just kill Shepard.

1. why I had said "You made things up" is simply that, and you mention those points above in 2., we have no idea how the situation REALLY is. Are there still reapers around? Where exactly is Shepard lying in the rubble? Is it still there where the beam hit her? How much time has passed?
 
You know, heacanon my way further I can even think that Major coates (under suspicion of being an Reaper-Agent in some theories) has given false information to the fleet and dragged Shepard way to ensure the indoc-process is undisturbed by both Reaper or Allied forces.

3. The war assets are just an example how to "sell" a wake-up. Sold right even plotholes would be forgotten, though I am still not convinced of massive plotholes anway. There is some general plothole-obsession I actually don't get, but I already lined out why. And the normandy, if used for some assault on Harby (aren't there even unused sound-files hinting at something like that? I am sure it came up sometime) all it would need is to use the ship for one suicidal assault against a weakened Harbinger, not multiple reapers. Also a good way to show Jokers piloting skills and give him some action. And why not multiple reapers, at least evading them should be possible for the heroes of an action-story...

And when you remember Harby in ME2...he wanted shepard alive all the time if possible. And why not? Shepard would be an invaluable war-asset used by the Reapers to shorten this already stuttering cycle. The Protheans had resisted centuries until they were wiped out. And now even with Earth gone the Reapers could use shepard and her skills to make sure this cycle wil end the way the  Reapers want...that's why it was never really their first intention to kill Shepard if not necessary. Like the Emperor didn't kill Luke, because he conisdered him a valuable ersatz for Vader...

4. there are many versions of the IT, and I am actually not the best expert on the matter. Not a true believer, but a "hoper", because in contrast to you I mostly see a lot of narrative possibilites from that point onwards where Shepard wakes up. It is a matter of storytelling-talent and imagination, as well as presentation of these ideas..then this "awakening" would be nowhere near being lame...my opinion at least.

And I actually prepare myself more for being dissapointed by an EC without IT. If Shepard is supposed to wake up in the rubble of London even when everything on board of the Citadel was true and real...oh my god, I am afraid not even my imagination can work out how shepard survived the initial blast in space, without a helmet and the following atmospheric reentry....not to mention the impact on the ground...

Modifié par Vox Draco, 02 juin 2012 - 05:48 .

[Eryri]

AxeloftheKey wrote...

I just figured Harby wanted him for the human reaper in ME2. Now that it's gone, he has no reason to keep you around anymore.

I dunno. IT has just failed to make a more compelling ending. The evidence is there, certainly, but I also feel that sometimes, the plotholes aren't as extensive as people assume.

I think the reapers were still planning to make another human reaper. The codex mentions that they're herding captured people into processing centres.

Harby has displayed a certain morbid fascination with Shep in ME2 and the Arrival DLC. Maybe Shep has some sort of unique mental quality that Harby wants to "assimilate" as evidenced by Shep surviving contact with the Prothean beacon when a lesser mortal would have died. 

[AxeloftheKey]

Perhaps. That's all still possible. But it still just doesn't leave Shepard in a very good place after waking up.

[Vox Draco]

AxeloftheKey wrote...

Perhaps. That's all still possible. But it still just doesn't leave Shepard in a very good place after waking up.

*laughs* Well, this is a statement I have nothing to say against!

But, just on a sidenote: Shepard and Mass Effect is for me foremost a sci-fi action-story, not a melodrama, arthouse/independent-movie. realism is all good, but don't we like to see and don't we enjoy to see our action-heroes, our Bruce Willis', Jason Stathams, Arnolds, and co to overcome any odds and triumph in the end, even if it is ridicolous sometimes?

Not to mention that Shepard has build a reputation on doing the impossible...among the first lines of spoken dialogue n the entire series. Would wrap up things niecely if shepard would really achieve the impossible, withstand the most insidious attack of the Reapers and together with her allies kikc the reapers back into the abyss they came from...

This is what we all expected, and what we wanted to see in the first place. Bioware should simply give this to us, and make most of their fanbase happy again...IT or not, IT is just the easiest and lore-freindliest way to achieve this!

[Eryri]

Vox Draco wrote...

AxeloftheKey wrote...

Perhaps. That's all still possible. But it still just doesn't leave Shepard in a very good place after waking up.

*laughs* Well, this is a statement I have nothing to say against!

But, just on a sidenote: Shepard and Mass Effect is for me foremost a sci-fi action-story, not a melodrama, arthouse/independent-movie. realism is all good, but don't we like to see and don't we enjoy to see our action-heroes, our Bruce Willis', Jason Stathams, Arnolds, and co to overcome any odds and triumph in the end, even if it is ridicolous sometimes?

Not to mention that Shepard has build a reputation on doing the impossible...among the first lines of spoken dialogue n the entire series. Would wrap up things niecely if shepard would really achieve the impossible, withstand the most insidious attack of the Reapers and together with her allies kikc the reapers back into the abyss they came from...

This is what we all expected, and what we wanted to see in the first place. Bioware should simply give this to us, and make most of their fanbase happy again...IT or not, IT is just the easiest and lore-freindliest way to achieve this!

Hear Hear! Reality is vastly over rated. Video games are supposed to be fun and entertaining after all.