The Thanix Cannons see widespread use by the time the Reapers arrive in the Milky Way, and yet every military force that clashes with the Reapers gets completely steamrolled, so obviously it didn't do all that much good. If it didn't work earlier on, there's no reason why it would suddenly work any better at the end. Again, if this is an inconsistency, then it's one that spans the whole game, not just the ending. [/quote]
Except we do not know exactly how much damage the Reapers are taking or just how widespread the Thanix Cannon is. If it only became commonplace for the Citadel armada, then other nations may not have them in abundance. Regardless, the Reapers attacked when everyone was completely unprepared, whereas the confrontation above Earth is a head on war. The former can obliterate even a superior army if they their forces are crippled as a result. Very different scenarios.
[quote]The image count at the end of ME2 put the number somewhere a little over 200. In ME3 the Reapers are stated to number in the thousands, so there's the first problem. Secondly, it's a little tricky when gauging whether or not the Reapers are truly outnumbered at the battle of Earth, because if we're taking individual fighter ships into account, we also have to account for the swarms of occuli each Reaper capital ship is capable of releasing to deal with fighters of that size. Plus, a single Reaper can take down a fleet, maybe more. Unlike the situation with Sovereign, the allies don't have the luxury of sustained focus-fire, because while they focus on one ship, a hundred or so of its buddies will be attacking at the same time as well. [/quote]
Those estimation could include every force aligned with the Reapers, not merely capital ships. Even if we do account for the Occuli, ME2 proved how insignificant their defenses are by destroying them in a single hit even without a Thanix. Fruthermore, no. With the upgraded firepower a single Reaper cannot withstand a fleet. This is evident by a Reaper being blown away. If they could withstand an entire fleet individually, they would not be suffering noticeable losses.
[quote]No, humans were selected to be the next capital ship, whereas the other races would be preserved in the form of Destroyers. Harbinger seemed to be using the Collectors to determine the best candidate for the next capital ship (The Collectors took unique individuals from all races before ME2), and it makes sense that once a decision was made, the Collectors would be put to the task of getting a jump start on the largest construct of that cycle.[/quote]
Destroyers can be destroyed by the Cain. I would like to imagine a galactic fleet has vastly superior firepower to a mini-nuke that requires little more than minerals and metal to build. If not we can easily get a ton of Cains to do the job.
[quote]Problem is the Reapers were taking minimal losses.[/quote]
If only one species is elevated to a capital level Reaper, as Harbinger's prattling would insinuate, then merely a loss of two per cycle would cut their force in half, at upon the capital level. Frankly, that is a low estimation of their casualties but nonetheless suggests there are much fewer capital Reapers, perhaps only numbering in the few hundreds.
[quote]One goes down, and in the process takes multiple ships with it. [/quote]
And? If we account all of the Fleet that arrives, we have plenty and thus far only fighters and frigates are suffering the greatest loss. In fact, we are never shown much in this regard.
[quote]The galaxy is significantly weaker. Reaper fleets were invading home worlds, destroying military forces, burning resources, the fleet attacking Earth in the end is all that can be spared while also keeping up some semblance of a fight for each homeworld. It's a fleet made out of the leftovers.[/quote]
Stronger in the sense Fighters can use Thanix Cannons now, something Sovereign never had to contend with. Furthermore, it only dealt with the bare minimum of the Citadel force as the majority was sent to the Relays. Not to mention they had to contend with the Geth. While the notion of leftovers is accurate, the galaxy fleet still amasses a massive armada. It depends on your perspective of the only cinematic we are shown.
[quote]"We are each a nation, independant, free of all weakness."
Not just Sovereign trying to sound super scary, Legion goes into great detail in ME2 about this aspect of the conciousness of a Reaper.[/quote]
Sovereign said a lot of things. Unfortunately most of it turned out to be nonsense. Why should I believe that one particular line when the remainder was either subverted, handwaved, blatantly ignored or retconned? As for Legion, he does not specifically rule out that possibility. In fact, what he does offer is limited.
[quote]Except it wouldn't make much sense from a narrative standpoint to have that thing you spend the entire game constructing not only suddenly being a trap, but also immediately destroyed. Furthermore, it wouldn't make any sense for the Crucible to be a trap, because if it were a device that would somehow benefit the Reapers, they'd have built it themselves, and it wouldn't exist as a precaution, because the Reapers clearly never expected anyone to disrupt their cycle the way the Protheans did, so a contingency plan would never have been necesarry, and again, if the Crucible were such a trap, Sovereign would have used it.[/quote]
Finding blueprints to a device that has been in development for millennias, yet never discovered until the tenth hour and presuming it will solve all your problems when you know absolutely nothing about it or what might actually happen upon completion, is not exactly strong narrative. How do we know the Reapers did not build it themselves or were in the process of doing so? They converted the Protheans into a bug slave species. I certainly would not put it passed them to fabricate design blueprints as a potential fail-safe. If Sovereign had attempted to use it, someone would have noticed. The Crucible is rather conspicuous and he was alone, thus stealth was necessary.
[quote]The Reapers are essentially a galactic force of nature, an incomprehensible threat, and stopping them would require some sort of sacrifice no matter what. To do any less would undermine not only ME3's own plot, but the entire series. Destroy wiping out all synthetics isn't out of place, it makes sense because the Crucible was designed by races that always went to war with synthetics, so there's no reason why they'd pass up a chance to kill two birds with one stone. Plus, having one ending where there was no sacrifice would turn what is a genuine choice into the illusion of choice, because there would be one right answer and multiple wrong answers, and choice is one of the largest themes in the series.[/quote]
We have plenty of sacrifice. Pick a homeworld, lots of death. Frankly, BioWare was throwing around sacrifice every bloody chance they got. The choice felt arbitrary because of how the Geth deserving "ife had been a highlight of the series, yet completely negated should you opt for Destroy. Neither Control nor Synthesis required you to make an equivalent sacrifice that essentially amounts to genocide. Furthermore, I offered one solution by making Earth the sacrifice. In either case, the idea is to reward players who strife for that one ending and the ability to "overcome the odds" which has also been a theme of the series.
Illusion of choice has occurred frequently before. Your decision regarding the Council, the Rachnii, the Collector Base, particularly everything to do with Cerberus. Better even, ME3's auto-dialogue is a prime example, or the dream sequences. Yeah, this would hardly have been the first instance of it.
[quote]They already do fit. The Illusive Man spent the game telling us the Crucible could be used to control the Reapers. The problem with him was that he didn't take his own advice, and instead of looking to organic ingenuity for the solution, he decided it would be a fun idea to fill himself with Reaper tech, cross his fingers, and hope that didn't bite him in the ass.[/quote]
... not a good example of that "strong narrative." TIM went from intelligent (relatively speaking) and manipulative to utterly incompetent. How Cerberus was even capable of pulling off what it does makes little sense. Every single instance in the entire series showed this would "bite him in the ass," including the umpteenth number of failed Cerberus experiments but I digress.
[quote]As for synthesis, well, the idea of this lack of understanding between organics and synthetics wasn't really touched on until Mass Effect 2, because in ME1 the Geth are just evil AI shock troopers, and it's not really until the final quarter of ME2, when you meet Legion, that the synthetics become something more than just an opposing force to be crushed. However, I'm of the opinion that they introduced this concept early enough, roughly halfway through the overall series, for it to be valid. As far as the mechanics of Synthesis, we got our first look at that with Legion's choice at the end of the Rannoch story arc. Legion essentially chooses a Synthesis of his own, sending out what made him special and giving it to the rest of his people, strengthening all while allowing them to obtain a new level of individuality and enlightenment. This is essentially what Synthesis does as well, so it's not like the concept comes out of left field at the very end of the game.[/quote]
Legion did not release some sort of magical beam that would convert all sentient life into cyborg hybrids. He focused only on the Geth, who are able to communicate as one mind and they had already reached consensus this was the choice they desired. The galaxy made no such agreement with Shepard. These circumstances are nothing at all alike. The fact we have absolutely no knowledge of what Synthesis truly entails when the choice is offered, makes it all the more problematic. It requires you completely accept the Catalyst's logic as face value and it does come out of left field as it remains the only portion of the series what the only explanation is purely magical. Why is Shepard able to change the Krogan? If we just need to toss a body in the funnel, well Anderson and TIM are just in the other room. Why is Shepard special?
[quote]Only with massive amounts of retconning that, in my opinion, could not have been accomplished just within the last ten minutes.[/quote]
No retcons required for the reasons stated. Granted, they have already happened with the Relays, among other things. Thus, it would not be their first time changing something.
Modifié par Bourne Endeavor, 02 juillet 2012 - 07:43 .
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