407 réponses à ce sujet

[Br3admax]

David7204 wrote...

Key plot advancements always depend on luck. It was luck that Shepard was the assigned to ship investigating Eden Prime. Luck that Shepard was the one to receive the vision.

Is this serious? No it wasn't luck. Shepard was picked specifically for this mission. Luck had nothing to do with it. Go play ME again.

Does that negate Shepard fighting through the geth? Saving Ashley? Helping the colonists? Not in the slightest.

Read the above.

I could of course make the same argument for pretty much any fiction in existence. Is it not 'luck' that out of all the people on the planet, the right characters always meet each other in a story?

No. Luck has nothing to do with that either. There is a difference between chance and luck, and even then, these aren't compariable in the slightest. Meeting someone and what you used as a "conventional" victory are completely different. 

[JonathonPR]

ImaginaryMatter wrote...

For a conventional victory kind of ending, perhaps Sovereign could be retconned a little bit. Maybe, at some point a character lampshades that the current batch of Reapers have much weaker shields than Sovereign. At that point some technician blurts out some techno-babble about how Sovereign was drawing power from the Citadel to strengthen it's shields (maybe through the cables it had attached?) and when Saren was destroyed is caused some sort of power surge, thus stunning Sovereign. Just a thought.

Soveirgn could have been the one chosen to stay i the galaxy because he had such a powerful and reseilent ship/body. The ME3 Reapers have no reason to hid outside the galaxy. They could have just hibernated in clusters around stars beyond the range of the relays and woken up on their own. Would a clock and passive sensors have taken up too much power when feeding off solar radiation. Why not camp out with the Collectors or similar locations. I was ecpecting the Reapers to have varried power levels and forms. Like the Primordials in Exalted there could have been some who were spread out over several ships. A single whole entinty that has spread its being out over mady bodies like a reverse Geth. One mind with a thousand voices. Or possibly a Grand Father scenario like in Traveller. There are three main generations with each one beholden to the one before it. Grand Father being the original entity who does not have to bother entering the galaxy because he has his "sons" and "daughters". The Reaper forces retreat after each cycle because they would rather be with Grand Father and the cycles are more like choores to take out the trash or clean out a pets cage. There are only a handful of second generation like Sovereign and Harbinger. The forces that blot out the sky are the third generation who are much less capable on theirown. I would have been fine with the ending being the cycle demonstrates some mixture of traits that the Grand Father wanted in a galaxy and the cyclle is called off. No cruicable, just the struggle for survival. Have a character that shows up from some new race that in the middle of the war is going around talking to members of the different races and observing them on a micro person to person scale. One of the second generation who is made up of millions of technoorganic mimic bodies. The big final battle being set up to test the convictions of the races of the cycle and what it is willing to do and those of its own children as well. Intellect is the ability to understand knowldge. Wisdom is the ability to understand experience. Knowldge is the gate, not the path. Some are so obsessed with the first they forget to follow the later. They come to judge theselves and others by a part and not the whole. 

ME3 was the end of the Reaper arc and felt like a story that should have ended in part one. A lack of spirit for the work itself and a focuse on the abilities of the artist. It was a seperate work based on the spirit of intent that changed.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

David7204 wrote...
Key plot advancements always depend on luck. It was luck that Shepard was the assigned to ship investigating Eden Prime.

I'd call it a mission assignment from his superiors at the time. And he was assigned the mission because of his training and skill. Not luck.

 
Luck that Shepard was the one to receive the vision.

How? The beacon worked exactly as planned. That was more a testament to the skill of the Protheans engineering than any 'luck' on Shepard's part.

Does that negate Shepard fighting through the geth? Saving Ashley? Helping the colonists? Not in the slightest.

Because Shepard is an exceedingly highly trained Special Operations Officer. I'd say his training is what got him there. Luck had nothing to do with it at all.

I could of course make the same argument for pretty much any fiction in existence.

And like nearly every one of your arguments, it'd be a really bad whine about how heroism has to matter.

Is it not 'luck' that out of all the people on the planet, the right characters always meet each other in a story?

I'd call it the most skillfull and well trained, determined characters working their ass off to get to the top. 

Modifié par MassivelyEffective0730, 26 novembre 2013 - 03:24 .

[dreamgazer]

David7204 wrote...

dreamgazer wrote...

Already covered: because anyone can go back and write the Reapers into a more manageable threat, whether it's by nerfing them or buffing their opponents.   It's called working within the established universe.

Dreamgazer, I'm having trouble understanding your immense difficulty with this very simple concept. I suppose I wasn't making myself plain enough. None of my changes diminish the Reapers as threats from what we see in ME 3. None of my changes narratively strengthen the galaxy. Do you understand those two sentences? Nothing I do significantly nerfs the Reapers or buffs their opponents. Is that clear enough? Perhaps you've become so used to the magic solutions proposed on the BSN you've forgotten any alternative exists.

(laughs)

You're literally buffing their opposition and nerfing the Reapers' indoctrination capabilities in ME1 and ME2.  

Try again.  Take a little longer to think out a response.

You seem to be operating the very, very silly and utterly wrong delusion correct assumption that if I change things in ME 1 and ME 2, it must be to give myself an easy way out.

Yes, you're orchestrating an answer for yourself, just as anyone else could do. 

[Stakrin]

 It didn't because of my powerful headcanon!

shelard didn't happen to ascend the elevator, the illusion man had been trying to program it. Shepard crawled to where TIM was standing. And he hit the button te illusive man was waiting to kill Shepard to hit. 
The catalyst was created by an extremely scientific species and uses some sort of iCloud thing to understand all synthetics, which is why he is to synthetics as Shepard is to animals 
also this is why destroying him will destroy all synthetics and becoming him allows you to control reapers. Synthesis is you and him combining then everyone following suit. 

If I stay in my head I will always be happy.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

David7204 wrote...

dreamgazer wrote...

Already covered: because anyone can go back and write the Reapers into a more manageable threat, whether it's by nerfing them or buffing their opponents.   It's called working within the established universe.

Dreamgazer, I'm having trouble understanding your immense difficulty with this very simple concept. I suppose I wasn't making myself plain enough. None of my changes diminish the Reapers as threats from what we see in ME 3. None of my changes narratively strengthen the galaxy. Do you understand those two sentences? Nothing I do significantly nerfs the Reapers or buffs their opponents. Is that clear enough? Perhaps you've become so used to the magic solutions proposed on the BSN you've forgotten any alternative exists.

You seem to be operating the very, very silly and utterly wrong delusion that if I change things in ME 1 and ME 2, it must be to give myself an easy way out.

And you seem to be missing the key gist of Dreamgazers argument: What is your golden, oh-so-perfect-and-meaningfully-heroic-and-lucky conventional victory scenario that you keep dancing around? You keep saying you can do better than everyone else. Well, show us what you've got.

[dreamgazer]

MassivelyEffective0730 wrote...

David7204 wrote...

dreamgazer wrote...

Already covered: because anyone can go back and write the Reapers into a more manageable threat, whether it's by nerfing them or buffing their opponents.   It's called working within the established universe.

Dreamgazer, I'm having trouble understanding your immense difficulty with this very simple concept. I suppose I wasn't making myself plain enough. None of my changes diminish the Reapers as threats from what we see in ME 3. None of my changes narratively strengthen the galaxy. Do you understand those two sentences? Nothing I do significantly nerfs the Reapers or buffs their opponents. Is that clear enough? Perhaps you've become so used to the magic solutions proposed on the BSN you've forgotten any alternative exists.

You seem to be operating the very, very silly and utterly wrong delusion that if I change things in ME 1 and ME 2, it must be to give myself an easy way out.

And you seem to be missing the key gist of Dreamgazers argument: What is your golden, oh-so-perfect-and-meaningfully-heroic-and-lucky conventional victory scenario that you keep dancing around? You keep saying you can do better than everyone else. Well, show us what you've got.

David7204 wrote...

How many times has this come up, Dreamgazer? I've given you answers. Funny how every time I post them you tend to vanish and complain to me a few days later you've never seen anything. Everything up the endings is more or less the same premise of uniting the galaxy, except more forces in general, several victories resulting in dead Reapers, removal of the Reaper's ability to indoctrinate, tweaks to the Battle of the Citadel, an overhaul of the galactic defenses while still giving them little narrative impact.

David7204 wrote...

I made an entire thread based on answering that first question. You can find it on my profile. I think you'll find the detail satisfying. 'Alternate Plot for ME 2' or something like that. 

As for the second, far more geth. A lot more. I think I'd like the very powerful Citadel fleets holding against the very powerful geth until Sovereign comes in and turns the tide. A lot more casualties and destruction - the Citadel utterly kicked in the teeth and the fleets along with it. But the crucial part is Sovereign defeated at full strength by the Alliance and weakened Citadel fleets without any 'overload' nonsense. That part, I'm not sure about. 

That's as far as we've gotten with this. 

Modifié par dreamgazer, 26 novembre 2013 - 03:27 .

[David7204]

dreamgazer wrote...

You're literally buffing their opposition and nerfing the Reapers' indoctrination capabilities in ME1 and ME2.  

You've once again failed to read and interpret correctly, Dreamgazer. Perhaps you missed this passage?

"But you see, instead of those improvements being a pointless magic wand that nullifies the entire story, they would very intentionally have almost no narrative impact. ME 3 would proceed with the Reapers succeed just as much as they do currently."

No narrative impact, Dreamgazer. No narrative impact. You know what that means? It means the 'buffs' have no significant effect on the story whatsoever. The 'buffs' make the galaxy no stronger. No narrative impact. That's what it means, Dreamgazer. It means the buffs have no effect. No narrative impact.

Indoctrination? Same situation. Do we ever see the Reapers use indoctination in ME 3? Ever fight hordes of indoctrinated troops? Aside from Cerberus, nope. Nothing in ME 3 is being narratively changed. Before, we don't see or feel any effects of indoctrination. After, we don't see or feel any effects of indoctrination. The Reapers are just as successful before and after the changes. The galaxy is just as overwhelmed.

Is this clear enough? Clear enough that the galaxy is no narratively stronger and the Reapers no weaker because of these changes? No narrative impact, Dreamgazer. No narrative impact.

Modifié par David7204, 26 novembre 2013 - 03:33 .

[CronoDragoon]

To approach this another way, is anyone actually going to argue that Eden Prime could not have been rewritten so as not to hinge the fate of the galaxy on the laziness of an unnamed NPC?

[dreamgazer]

David7204 wrote...

dreamgazer wrote...

You're literally buffing their opposition and nerfing the Reapers' indoctrination capabilities in ME1 and ME2.  

You've once again failed to read and interpret correctly, Dreamgazer. Perhaps you missed this passage?

"But you see, instead of those improvements being a pointless magic wand that nullifies the entire story, they would very intentionally have almost no narrative impact. ME 3 would proceed with the Reapers succeed just as much as they do currently."

No narrative impact, Dreamgazer. No narrative impact. You know what that means? It means the 'buffs' have no significant effect on the story whatsoever. The 'buffs' make the galaxy no stronger. No narrative impact. That's what it means, Dreamgazer. It means the buffs have no effect. No narrative impact.

Indoctrination? Same situation. Do we ever see the Reapers use indoctination in ME 3? Ever fight hordes of indoctrinated troops? Aside from Cerberus, nope. Nothing in ME 3 is being narratively changed. Before, we don't see or feel any effects of indoctrination. After, we don't see or feel any effects of indoctrination. The Reapers are just as successful before and after the changes.

They do make a narrative impact, David.  That's what you're not grasping.  You saying it doesn't make a narrative impact doesn't make it the truth!  

Also, I'd play through the game again and pay attention to the side missions and dialogue if you're going to make claims about indoctrination during the Reaper extermination.  Hint: you're wrong. 

[GreyLycanTrope]

David7204 wrote...

Don't assume everyone is as helpless as you.

David7204 wrote...

Did posting that make you feel powerful?

Modifié par Greylycantrope, 26 novembre 2013 - 03:43 .

[David7204]

Yes, it does make it truth, if ME 3 is portrayed to be just as desperate of a struggle. Which it would be.

I tell you what. If you'd like, you can imagine to yourself that my hypothetical version of ME 3 has more Reapers. Enough Reapers to precisely counterbalance any advantages the hypothetical galaxy has over the actual one. So the galaxy has more preparations, but there's also more Reapers.

So how's that? Any 'strength' I'm bringing into the galaxy is precisely balanced out by bringing in more Reapers. I am intentional making the enemy more powerful. Intentionally making my job harder. Does that aid you in seeing that this is no cop out?

[Br3admax]

David7204 wrote...

Yes, it does make it truth, if ME 3 is portrayed to be just as desperate of a struggle. Which it would be.

No, it really doesn't. 

I tell you what.

He said it. He really said it. This is a big day for me.

If you'd like, you can imagine to yourself that my hypothetical version of ME 3 has more Reapers. Enough Reapers to precisely counterbalance any advantages the hypothetical galaxy has over the actual one. So the galaxy has more preparations, but there's also more Reapers.

So how's that? Any 'strength' I'm bringing into the galaxy is precisely balanced out by bringing in more Reapers. I am intentional making the enemy more powerful. Intentionally making my job harder. Does that aid you in seeing that this is no cop out?

It seems like you are grasping at straws here. Having more time to prepare but then bringing in more Reapers doesn't change anything at all. If you are trying to give the galaxy some edge, numbers would still only go as far. Also consider that changing the number of Reapers is still changing parts of ME2, as well as considering that we do not actually know the number of Reapers. 

[David7204]

That's the entire point I've been attempting to make clear. It doesn't change anything. And it's completely intentional.

And no, changing the number of Reapers isn't changing ME 2 at all.

Modifié par David7204, 26 novembre 2013 - 03:55 .

[dreamgazer]

David7204 wrote...

Yes, it does make it truth, if ME 3 is portrayed to be just as desperate of a struggle. Which it would be.

I tell you what. If you'd like, you can imagine to yourself that my hypothetical version of ME 3 has more Reapers. Enough Reapers to precisely counterbalance any advantages the hypothetical galaxy has over the actual one. So the galaxy has more preparations, but there's also more Reapers.

So how's that? Any 'strength' I'm bringing into the galaxy is precisely balanced out by bringing in more Reapers. I am intentional making the enemy more powerful. Intentionally making my job harder. Does that aid you in seeing that this is no cop out?

(laughs)

I don't care what you do with your scenario, David, though I do find "precisely balanced out" to be quite amusing.  Besides, I don't see you doing this ... "job", outside of implying that brute force and heroism will win the day.  And what happened to preparing for the Reapers being bad storytelling? 

You're rewriting the previous games, in any event.  My challenge was to compose a conventional victory for Mass Effect 3 without touching Mass Effect 1 and Mass Effect 2, thus preserving everything established beforehand.  Can you do that?

[BaladasDemnevanni]

David7204 wrote...

That's the entire point I've been attempting to make clear. It doesn't change anything. And it's completely intentional.

And no, changing the number of Reapers isn't changing ME 2 at all.

So what exactly have you accomplished then, if nothing's changed about the Reapers' strength?

[David7204]

Simple. I've made the story and conflict tighter. I've given ME 1 and ME 2 much more satisfying impacts.

[BaladasDemnevanni]

dreamgazer wrote...

David7204 wrote...

Yes, it does make it truth, if ME 3 is portrayed to be just as desperate of a struggle. Which it would be.

I tell you what. If you'd like, you can imagine to yourself that my hypothetical version of ME 3 has more Reapers. Enough Reapers to precisely counterbalance any advantages the hypothetical galaxy has over the actual one. So the galaxy has more preparations, but there's also more Reapers.

So how's that? Any 'strength' I'm bringing into the galaxy is precisely balanced out by bringing in more Reapers. I am intentional making the enemy more powerful. Intentionally making my job harder. Does that aid you in seeing that this is no cop out?

(laughs)

I don't care what you do with your scenario, David, though I do find "precisely balanced out" to be quite amusing.  Besides, I don't see you doing this ... "job", outside of implying that brute force and heroism will win the day.  And what happened to preparing for the Reapers being bad storytelling? 

You're rewriting the previous games, in any event.  My challenge was to compose a conventional victory for Mass Effect 3 without touching Mass Effect 1 and Mass Effect 2, thus preserving everything established beforehand.  Can you do that?

I think it's doable, especially if we're allowed to touch the time gap between ME2/Arrival and ME3.

Instead of the Reapers arriving as big and strong as ever, we find out that huffing it manually through darkspace since ME1's ending does huge problems for their survivability, which is somewhat in line with Vigil's suggestion in ME1.

Keep most of the galaxy-uniting missions intact. The only problem this really introduces is: what sort of ground-side mission do we toss Shepard at, if we're winning this war with cannons and ships?

[dreamgazer]

BaladasDemnevanni wrote...

David7204 wrote...

That's the entire point I've been attempting to make clear. It doesn't change anything. And it's completely intentional.

And no, changing the number of Reapers isn't changing ME 2 at all.

So what exactly have you accomplished then, if nothing's changed about the Reapers' strength?

It all rounds back to this vague defeat over them that he's not explaining. 

Modifié par dreamgazer, 26 novembre 2013 - 04:00 .

[Br3admax]

David7204 wrote...

That's the entire point I've been attempting to make clear. It doesn't change anything. And it's completely intentional.

And no, changing the number of Reapers isn't changing ME 2 at all.

Considering that the current number of Reapers were established 100,000 years ago, yeah it does. Also, you being irrelevant is not a better story. Try again. 

[BaladasDemnevanni]

David7204 wrote...

Simple. I've made the story and conflict tighter. I've given ME 1 and ME 2 much more satisfying impacts.

I can't say I'm feeling the satisfaction, David.

[David7204]

There is no established number of Reapers, Br3ad.

[Iakus]

BaladasDemnevanni wrote...

iakus wrote...

And anything powerful enough to destroy  a Reaper should pretty much fry anything in its path, synthetic or organic.  

Wait, since when do EMPs target organics?

Now, if the EMPs utterly wreck the oxygen supplies on board alliance vessels, that would at least make sense.

Since when do EMPs target anything in particular?

It's not healthy to get struck by lightning. 

Modifié par iakus, 26 novembre 2013 - 04:04 .

[Linkenski]

Br3ad wrote...

David7204 wrote...

Key plot advancements always depend on luck. It was luck that Shepard was the assigned to ship investigating Eden Prime. Luck that Shepard was the one to receive the vision.

Is this serious? No it wasn't luck. Shepard was picked specifically for this mission. Luck had nothing to do with it. Go play ME again.

I think you're missing the point slightly. All Shepard had to do was recover the beacon. It was luck that Sovereign came and interrupted and luck that Shepard was the one who got too close to the beacon and received the vision, but otherwise yes, he was specifically picked for this mission for the sake of getting that beacon. That's why we follow Shepard as the protagonist in the first place, because it's predetermined in the narrative that this is the guy who uncovers the Reaper myth/threat.
So i'd argue that any starting point for a story isn't contrived, but some of the later conveniences definitely are. That Tali is suddently on Freedom's Progress, that Kalros is the biggest Thresher Maw on the same place of Tuchanka as the Shroud and that Sovereign is beaten because he's channeling through Saren, who is shot by Shepard etc.

Sorry if I came into the middle of the argument, but this just struck me.

[Adrian Shepherd]

MassivelyEffective0730 wrote...

dreamgazer wrote...

Things went "questionable" for me once Shepard got up after being hit by a Reaper's laser. Headcanon takes over at that point forward, trying to make better sense of what went down in a heavily-flawed stab at something interesting.

I didn't dislike Priority Earth the way others on this forum did. Grim, dilapidated, dark, and maze-like was what I was expecting the setting to be like for the final push against the mile-high extermination squad who have been pounding away at the galaxy for somewhere around a year.

Ditto on the top part.

The second paragraph, I don't really think that's why it's so poorly viewed (Priority Earth). Rather I think it's a combination of he bleakness, the emptiness, the lack of seeing anything that you accomplished over the period of the game, etc.

You spent all this time building this massive force, all to learn that it's more or less completely notional, with nothing more than a few different cutscenes and a few differences in dialogue to show for it. I remember, if the blog is to be believed, what Patrick Weekes said about the final battle. You didn't see anybody fighting against the Reapers except Shepard and a few 'battalions'. It was really disappointing, especially when everyone was expecting to see all these big war assets doing some kind of discernable effect on the battle, seeing how having certain war assets might affect how a particular portion plays out or what not. As it is, we're merely informed of what is going on, with an arbitrary number dictating whether we get anything good or bad from the Crucible.

Agree with all of the above!