62 réponses à ce sujet

[Condooo]

Stumbled across something the other day that I thought was worth noting, and after looking through some of the previous threads in the old form, I wanted to throw this out there.

 

Starting from Mass Effect 1, Shepard is ranked as Lt. Commander, and is reinstated at the rank of Commander in Mass Effect 3 officially through an email from Hackett (fictional rank or whatever). However, if you go to Shepard's quarters and change his casual clothing, there's an option to change to what appears as a more senior officer's garb. Looking closer on his collar, you notice he's wearing badges, two vertical gold bars, a badge reserved for the rank of Captain.

 

 

My question is, how does Shepard qualify to wear these badges? Since he's part of the navy, is it simply because he's the Acting Captain of the Normandy (though I have no proof to back up that he's officially Acting Captain)?

 

Discussion welcome.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

That's not a real military rank right there.

 

Also, wrong Captain. That's a U.S. Army and Air Force Captain insignia. There is no Gold Bar for Captains. Only Second Lieutenants and Majors have Gold Rank insignia.

 

A U.S. Navy/Coast Guard Captain (or Army, Air Force, and Marine Corps Colonel) would have the Eagle with it's wings outstretched:

 

 

My view is that in ME3, he's above and beyond the alliance. He has a rank, but its meaningless. I view him as not being called Commander as not being his rank, but its his title. It's what he is now. The Commander. 

 

Technically, a rank is a title that you keep until you die.

 

Assuming that Shepard was a U.S. Naval Commander, his rank would be the silver oak leaf:

 

[Condooo]

Ahh, thanks for clearing that up. My military knowledge is okay, but it isn't fantastic. So what I assumed to be an insignia must have simply been decorative. 

[von uber]

Er why would she be US military and have US rank badges?

[MassivelyEffective0730]

Er why would she be US military and have US rank badges?

 

I wish they did. It's a very clear system, and easy to really lay down the set rules for. And this is having worked with members from over 30 other militaries. The regulations on the other hand can be pretty crappy to look at.

[Killdren88]

After ME3 in the destroy ending..I think S/he may have earned a rank or two..No doubt Hackett will be Humanity's leader. So I can see Shep taking his place as an Admiral. That is of course Shep even wants the job.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

After ME3 in the destroy ending..I think S/he may have earned a rank or two..No doubt Hackett will be Humanity's leader. So I can see Shep taking his place as an Admiral. That is of course Shep even wants the job.

 

Eh, in my ending, Shepard is the hidden leader of humanity. The alliance thinks they're in charge, but his reformed Cerberus is, among other things, pulling all the strings.

[TheOneTrueBioticGod]

Er why would she be US military and have US rank badges?

Well, the Alliance is a overarching alliance between the nations of Earth. The United States, which became the United North American States when Canada and Mexico agreed to join up, is still the most powerful, competing with China (Shanxi was a predominately Chinese colony.) It makes sense that the military hierarchy follows the same way as before.  

[Han Shot First]

The odd thing regarding Shepard's rank in ME3 is that is abbreviated as CDR.  CDR is the abbreviation for the Commander rank, however in ME1 Shepard's rank was Lt. Commander. The abbreviation for a Lt. Commander would be LCDR. If not for the codex this would have lead me to believe that Shepard was promoted at some point off-screen, perhaps posthumously, after being KIA at the start of Mass Effect 2. The problem is that according to the codex there is no Commander rank in the Alliance chain-of-command. It jumps from Lt. Commander to Staff Commander.

 

Of course the real reason for this discrepancy is that one of the devs likely goofed when abbreviating Shepard's rank, and forgot that he was a Lt. Commander rather than a Commander.

 

Still, if ME4 is a sequel I hope they throw a Commander rank between Lt. Commander and Staff Commander to resolve it...or have CDR be the Alliance abbreviation for Staff Commander. (and yes, I know that I'm being nit-picky) 

[von uber]

The most irritating thing for me is the whole 'hooooo raaaaa' bollocks.
Really, really annoys me like nothing else.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Bioware, for some stupid reason, really f****** up the military ranking system. A little bit of internetz on the part of DK and that problem would have been solved in ME Revelations when writing the lore. But no. Major gets to be equal to naval Captain in ME Systems Alliance. My guess is so that you have more incentive to shoot Kaidan during the coup attempt. I know they're a Canadian Company, but the system isn't even close to Canada's.

 

Anyway, Shepard's first name is Commander. His/Her rank is also Commander. So it's Commander Commander Shepard. It has to be because Bioware was too lazy to set a maximum number of letters for the first name, and put that on the plaque at the end of the game. 

[themikefest]

They did mess up the ranking. Case in point is Traynor. At one point Shepard calls her Lt Specialist when those are two seperate ranks. A Lt is an Officer and a specialist(E-4) is a NCO(non-commissioned officer)

[AlexMBrennan]

My question is, how does Shepard qualify to wear these badges?

They don't, and you've just spent more time researching the subject than the artist that made the model?

 

As for the rest, you can explain most problems away by remembering that Shepard is not a US Marine (or whatever branch you happen to be serving in) but a member of the fictional Alliance and as such all titles, abbreviations and insignias could easily be different from those used by any given branch of any military.l 

[MassivelyEffective0730]

They did mess up the ranking. Case in point is Traynor. At one point Shepard calls her Lt Specialist when those are two seperate ranks. A Lt is an Officer and a specialist(E-4) is a NCO(non-commissioned officer)

 

Sam's too much of a scared bunny to be a Specialist. I can see her being an Lt. though.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

Most of all, I think they just said '**** it' with the whole lore by that point. They just used whatever worked to tell the story they wanted to tell. 

[themikefest]

Sam's too much of a scared bunny to be a Specialist. I can see her being an Lt. though.

She is scared, but throughout the game does gain a little bit of a backbone.

 

I don't think she wouldn't mind being an Lt. More money than being a specialist

[jtav]

Sam refers to herself as a civilian, so she's the equivalent of a civilian DOD employee who got drafted because she was there. Comm Specialist seems to be a job title.

[Invisible Man]

I always thought shepard was a staff commander, not a lt. commander. where is his/her rank stated officially?

[DeinonSlayer]

Given other inaccuracies such as people saluting with their left hand, I could see them having grabbed the US Army rank insignia without doing further research. It's an oversight. I can think of bigger ones.

[themikefest]

Given other inaccuracies such as people saluting with their left hand, I could see them having grabbed the US Army rank insignia without doing further research. It's an oversight. I can think of bigger ones.

The saluting with the left hand I found to be disrespectful.

[DeinonSlayer]

The saluting with the left hand I found to be disrespectful.

Agreed. I'm not military, but I know that much. The first guy to do it that I noticed was the guy in ME2 guarding Legion before you wake him up.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

It's like they couldn't spend 5 minutes on the internet to look up stuff. Oh yeah, Resources. It's like they never watched any historical documentaries to learn about what hand to salute with. It's like they never even watched a f****** movie that involved a military story. The face palm isn't big enough. For an alien military - go for it: do whatever you want. But for Earth, there are a lot of things in common between nations.

[DeinonSlayer]

It's like they couldn't spend 5 minutes on the internet to look up stuff. Oh yeah, Resources. It's like they never watched any historical documentaries to learn about what hand to salute with. It's like they never even watched a f****** movie that involved a military story. The face palm isn't big enough. For an alien military - go for it: do whatever you want. But for Earth, there are a lot of things in common between nations.

I wasn't familiar with the Heer salute until I watched "The Desert Fox" on Netflix - history vids typically only showed the political salute we're all familiar with. Different nations used different gestures at different times, but yeah, the one they tried to emulate is ubiquitous enough today that they ought to have gotten it right.

[grey_wind]

To be honest, I've always thought the entire idea of Spectres is nonsensical, and just a convenient narrative handwave to excuse any controversial actions Shepard takes.

 

Shep should have just been kept Alliance military. That way, he could jump through ranks throughout the trilogy (presuming the trilogy actually skipped reasonable amounts of time between each installment) and thus it would be far more rational that he was spearheading the war effort as a high ranking military officer.

 

My two cents, anyhow.

[Han Shot First]

Equally as silly as the left-handed salutes were nonsensical Star Wars promotions (Ashley leaps from Gunnery Chief to Lt. Commander), and nearly every named Alliance character in ME3 being an officer. I think Traynor is the lone exception.