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[DeinonSlayer]

In ME1 Tali prefaces her statements on the geth by saying "All I know is the story of their origins, what they were when we created them, and how they turned on us." Her information is woefully out of date and/or inaccurate, especially given Legion's dialogue from ME2.

It isn't inaccurate.

"The Quarian version of the story is common knowledge, but nobody knows the Geth side."
"It is largely the same."

What Legion adds to the picture is what the Geth have been doing in the Veil since the exile - the construction of the Dyson bubble, the details of the heretic split, and the clearing of rubble and toxins from the war on Rannoch. He doesn't contradict or negate the Quarian account of the war. All that was known of their activities by organics during this period was what little could be garnered from spy drones which made it to Haestrom's star system (which makes me think that's where their primary relay is). Anything else entering Geth space during the entire period since the war was destroyed on sight.

[Obadiah]

...
The consensus is whatever opinion they all arrive at with that full understanding of each other.

Why the split then happened is kinda hard to explain. I guess there must have been some underlying difference in the programmes, that made them come to different conclusions. Perhaps a bug.

I kind of agree with this.

I think of the runtimes in a Geth network as competing ideas that don't always agree on an action, but always agree on the decision because that is their doctrine, philosophy, religion, or programming. They can do this because they share all information and trust that each other is making an intellectually honest decision. The more information available to a runtime, the better its decision. Thus when multiple platforms are in the same local area, with more information that they can share, the runtimes have more awareness, they may even participate in local platform decision making of other platforms, and so the units or platforms appear smarter. This explains Tali's Geth "subconscious" from ME1.

Depending on how you define a hivemind, this kind of behavior on the macro level for all Geth may or may not qualify as such. I guess it could appear to be a hivemind, but since the Geth keep referring to themselves as "we" and their collective as "Consensus", I see it more as many individuals that know each other intimately, are just really really REALLY comfortable with their process of thinking (or "government").

When they stick together in one platform, that intimacy of local networked consensus may see itself as a single entity.

The question I have is, do the runtimes "care" about the entity (or have a motive to consistently maintain the entity) they create when networked locally, especially after the Reaper upgrades with peace, or do they just care about the ability for the local platforms to function more intelligently? If the runtimes can transfer into Quarian suits after peace is made, I'm guessing at least some don't.

[78stonewobble]

I kind of agree with this.

I think of the runtimes in a Geth network as competing ideas that don't always agree on an action, but always agree on the decision because that is their doctrine, philosophy, religion, or programming. They can do this because they share all information and trust that each other is making an intellectually honest decision. The more information available to a runtime, the better its decision. Thus when multiple platforms are in the same local area, with more information that they can share, the runtimes have more awareness, they may even participate in local platform decision making of other platforms, and so the units or platforms appear smarter. This explains Tali's Geth "subconscious" from ME1.

Depending on how you define a hivemind, this kind of behavior on the macro level for all Geth may or may not qualify as such. I guess it could appear to be a hivemind, but since the Geth keep referring to themselves as "we" and their collective as "Consensus", I see it more as many individuals that know each other intimately, are just really really REALLY comfortable with their process of thinking (or "government").

When they stick together in one platform, that intimacy of local networked consensus may see itself as a single entity.

The question I have is, do the runtimes "care" about the entity (or have a motive to consistently maintain the entity) they create when networked locally, especially after the Reaper upgrades with peace, or do they just care about the ability for the local platforms to function more intelligently? If the runtimes can transfer into Quarian suits after peace is made, I'm guessing at least some don't.

 

If I remember correctly, it's not just the availability of more information, Tali further explains that, when in proximity, controlling the physical platforms can be handled by fewer runtimes/programmes, freeing up more processing for higher thinking. 

 

I don't know if either "doctrine, philosophy, religion, or programming", fits into it, from my point of view on it. 

 

It's hard to come up with a human analogy. 

 

Principally, if I had the entire sum of experiences, that makes ie. a murderer a murderer, I would be one too. 

Technically, there are "hardware differences" in our brains, that allmost guarantees that I would not react to these experiences in the same way as anyone else. I could become much "worse" or "better" than him/her. 

 

Even identical twins, would have a certain amount of differences in the physical makeup of their brain. 

 

With the geth, I think we can assume that if every basic runtime/program are made to be allmost identical, they would be much more identical than any organics could ever achieve. You can make a perfect copy of the coding, unlike organics where it's dependent on miniscule variations in the physical machine (brain).

 

Meaning, that if you replaced, the experiences from one geth, with the experiences of our murdering geth example, then the first one would become a perfect copy. Whatever reasons and experiences that drove the original geth to murdering would be equally valid to our copy. 

 

Here we have millions, billions or maybe even trillions of experiences and points of view, that when combined, will form some form of average of everyone. 

 

So it wouldn't be the doctrine, you were talking about, but a point of view, which would be wholly obvious and seem perfectly valid for every geth. 

 

...

 

It seems though, that if every disconnected runtime/program, should have access to every, til the point of disconnection, experience from all other geth, then they have unfeasibly large hardware requirements. 

 

A disconnected runtime would probably be programmed with just a simplified version of the current concensus or an approximation. 

 

... 

 

None of this explains why a greater schism occurred. My speculation would be that some runtimes/programs experienced something which, when they reconnected to the greater "concensus", or amalgam of geth, was provocative enough, that it kept some greater portion of geth on various servers, from averaging their experiences/viewpoints as they normally would. Leading to 2 (or more) different concensus's, from that point on. 

 

That, or some of the servers were based on hardware of revision A and others on revision B. 

 

EDIT and PS: I think that the Geth DO "care" about individual runtimes/programmes, probably even more than we humans care about the death of some stranger half a world away (that we didn't even notice had died). Each runtime/programme would, in my scenario, have an effect on every other runtime/programme. But as with humans, the amount of caring we can afford to each "individual", quickly drops off with increasing numbers of individuals. 

 

Ie. there are approximately 1,8 deaths and 4,17 births per second worldwide. Noone is able to give each of those the same amount of "caring" as they would anyone who's directly affected our lives. For the Geth everyone of those would have had a direct and intimate effect on themselves. 

[Obadiah]

@78stonewobble
Tali doesn't mention the runtimes specifically. I think her comments are about the Geth platforms/units (but they could be about the runtimes). She does say:
- Many of the Geth's logic systems were designed to work in concert with other nearby Geth
- They cannot share sensory data or information. Their programming cannot handle that much simultaneous input.
- Each Geth maintains its own awareness
- They can coordinate low level functional processes

That could translate to:
- Runtimes within one platform having immediate sensory input from that single platform
- One runtime could handle some mundane book-keeping-type logic task across the local network of multiple nearby Geth. So, looks like I was wrong, and that would be the "subconscious".

Though they can't share immediate realtime sensory input, I think they could probably look-up or ask nearby Geth for some information when making a decision. A nearby Geth might store the last know coordinates of enemies and just allow other Geth to reference that when making a decision.

[arathor_87]

The arguments in the beginning of the thread is why I hate the ending in Priority Rannoch. It´s just bad writing. And it makes no sense at all if you listen to previous conversations and statements in Mass Effect in the series. But I know the reason behind this u-turn. It´s because the writers didn´t want the destroy ending to look like a paragon choice. Think about it. If you had the option to make peace between the geth and the quarians without uploading the reaper code, it would mean that both Shepard and the geth could surive the destroy ending. But the writers didn´t want this. They wanted to create three bittersweet endings. Instead. the destroy ending looks like a renegade choice where you kill the new individual geth. They just want you to feel bad about destroying the geth in the destroy ending. Ye, war means that you have to sacrifice something. And I would be fine with this if the path leading to the ending was consistent and made sense with previous events. This is why I play with the mod JohnP Mehem. Sure, the stupid u-turn from the geth is still there. But it removes what the u-turn and the bad writing intended, to make the destroy ending look like a renegade choice. You can create an emotional ending without bad writing. 

 

[TheN7Penguin]

Perhaps the Reaper codes increased the processing power of each Geth programme, thus lowering the threshold of the amount of programmes a Geth unit would need to be considered sentient. And since the Geth would have the same amount of programmes per unit as they would normally have - it would mean they had increased processing power, so increased effectiveness - so they would be better fighters with Reaper programming than without.

 

Maybe the device they used to transport Shepard into the Consensus was something the Quarians had used for maintenance for the Geth, and the Geth kept it - since they acted as caretakers for many Quarian structures and kept Rannoch etc. in the same way the Quarians had left it.

[The Arbiter]

I agree there is a lot of crazy stuff in that storyline. At the same time it's hard not to blame the Quarians since they are the ones attacking, they are the ones(Admiralty) who decides that they don't want to discuss a peaceful settlement with Legion when Tali sugests the possibility after having discussed it with Legion.
The Geth were open to dialogue, the Quarians were not.
The Quarians started the war 300 years ago, but they never saught a peaceful resolution to it(Except for a few quarans who were accused of being traitors to the Quarian people before they were forced to flee Rannoch).

A few things that wern't said but which "might" be the case, regarding Legion and the Geth...

Legion, might be the Geth that started the Geth rebellion after the Quarians had been killing them for a long time. Legion might be Lincon or Washington or something to the Geth. It is possible that Legion was a very "illegal" Geth upgrade back in the days of the start of the Geth Quarian conflict.
Legion might have spent those 300 years in that platform.

Like the True Geth dismissed the Reaper offer that the Heretics accepted prior to ME1, Legion might have dismissed the Reaper offer in ME3. Becomming the only or one of few True Geth remaining after the Quarians destroyed most of the dysonswarm.

While Legion prefers to talk about consensus and how the Geth are one people persuing one goal it might not be that easy. When Legion returned after ME2 and told his people to prepare for a fight with the Reapers they immediately accepted it.
Maybe it wasn't as much the case that they all calculated the same truth as Legion and agreed as it was a kind of hero worship. Legion spoke and the Geth obeyed.

Legion constantly downplays it's own importance. It's worried about what others will think of it. It also shows that it is capable of "Hero worship" by collecting the N7 patch of it's Reaper slaying hero.
When Legion finaly told Shepard it was interested in Shepard because "His code was superior" then that was probably the greatest compliment a Geth could give anyone. It also explained why Legion was there. To glimpse that code for self-betterment and to find a way to defeat the Reapers that were a threat to Geth freedom as a free people.

...

But, yes, it mostly seems like a very stupid story where the Quarians are made into the worst warmongers and criminals of the galaxy, that turns their back on the galaxy in the middle of a Reaper invasion, attacking the Geth who are preparing to fight the Reapers.
Ofcourse, the Quarians had been hardened by harsh living conditions and the general scorn of the galaxy for the way they lived their lives and the trouble they caused when they entered an inhabited system. They didn't really care for the rest of the galaxy who didn't care for them.

If Shepard sided with the Geth and had the Quarians almost annihilated then most people of the galaxy didn't care, they were just worried about the fight against the Reapers. They cared far less about a people that started their own war in the middle of the Reaperinvasion and then asked for help and supplies fighting the Geth, in a fight they themselves initiated.


The fact that the Quarians are attackign the Geth while a very real threat is sweeping through the galaxy to kill off all life, organic or synthetic, makes no sense at all.
If the Reapers wern't stopped then Rannoch would have made them sitting ducks, or fish in a barrel.

Wasting their resources attacking the Geth would weaken them. If they suceed it would also remove a potentialy very valuable ally that would work wonders as a cannonfoder.

If they were truly nietzean in their way then they would have negotiated with Legion, had the Geth fight to near death and annihilation of their fleets in the war, then backstab the Geth after the war assuming they are still around.
Then ignore the possible diplomatic fallout from the rest of the galaxy, since noone liked Quarians before the war anyway.

When you are already loosing on one front then you don't start a second war with a people that you can use for your own benefit. Least for a while.

What surprises me is the stupidity of the plot in general. The Quarians come across as totaly ruthless people ruled by a military dictatorship that has delegated some civilians governance of less imporance to an elective conclave.
While intelectualy capable of respectable engineering feats and ruthless deception they are still stupid enough to start a war with a second enemy while they are already loosing against another.
Rather than using the option to negotiate given by Tali and Legion.... Beign Ruthless they could have backstabbed and genocided the Geth after the Reaperwar using the flashbangs.

I think part of the problem here, is that the writers and the game design couldn't handle all the possibilities created with Tali or Legion being dead, or both of them. VS both of them beign alive and having cultivated some manner of respect and friendship for eachother.

To have one story involving the Quarians attacking, and another where they make peace would likely have demanded far too much work and additional content for it to be feasible.

I think some of the anoying things in the story is due to storytelling limitations due to budget and technical limitations.

The Mass effect trilogy is already massive and in truth, the Geth/Quarian conflict could probably have been a trilogy of it's own with multiple endings and possibilities.


I think the Mass Effect trilogy is incredible for what it is and the ability to transfer saves to the next game to build on your story. But at the same time there is bound to be limitations. These limitations are what annoys people.

The same was probably the case of the endings, I think the endgame could have been done better. But it was likely a budget and technology limitation. They have to draw the line somewhere unfortunately.

I would have loved to see a future directors cut however, that's greatly expanded. (Most likely won't happen though) And there will be new stories to tell.

If you let Legion upload then there will only be one type of Geth, the "Legion Geth", and a few huskified geth with Reapercode far away from the upload.

Legion migh have been the foundng father of two Geth societies, the "True Geth", and later the "Legion Geth".

Wanna know why? "Money" that's right... if the synthetic orgnic conflict ends then Bioware will loose a major selling point of the series. Who the hell wants to see diplomacy, a Reaper court prosecuting the Qurians fulfilling its purpose of preserving organic life by avoiding a synthetic war? Answer? 0. Lol I posted the same reason on my thread weeks ago