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[Danny Boy 7]

Well all this thread has really accomplished is showing there are those who are willing to accept anything that Bioware gives them for science (nothing wrong with that, as this is fiction after all), and people who get hung up on the idea that they know everything about the ME universe despite the fact there are clearly unknowns all over the place.

 

I get that you guys don't like Andromeda, you want Milky Way, but guess what? What's done is done, and Andromeda is the name of the next game. Accept it and be happy, or reject it and be all grumpy. Personally I think this is the best thing Bioware could have done. They have a clean slate, and they get a story that has some great Battlestar Galactica feels to it. Win-Win.

 

Technology evolves over time, in times of war it takes great giant leaps as prohibitions are abandoned and oodles of money are thrown at scientists.

Right? I'm hoping that along with the whole frontier exploration thing that we get some action on a massive dreadnought that has the races interacting, fighting over resources, a military/civilian conflict maybe. Some atmospheric things like maybe one of the characters gets pregnant and throughout we hear her fears about everything until the baby is born at the end of the game.

[Spetulhu]

The reason council races can't travel without regular drive discharge is some technical limitation that the Reapers don't seem to have. Maybe it can be overcome in some way? Either through technobabble, space magic or something that sounds like real tech.

 

In normal space you don't have to keep the drive running all the time, after all - once you build up speed you'll keep going until you decelerate or hit something that slows you down. So I guess the FTL drive doesn't just propel the ship forwards, it actually keeps it in FTL and thus builds up charge. If you could keep the ship in FTL by some other mechanic which didn't build up charge it would solve your problem. Hell, there might already be something like that but it's seen as impractical, unsafe or outright suicidal. If the FTL drive has to run to keep you in FTL you can drop out by shutting it off. If it didn't, but you had to do something to get out it could lead to problems if you had taken damage.

[Renmiri1]

Well, you kind of already have it there. Reapers seem to posses tech that bypasses static discharge issue. If we're going with "reverse engineered Reaper Tech" excuse, then we're arriving in Andromeda within 200 years. Not THAT enormous timeframe

 

Or we beat the tech out of Ghost Boy

[The Hierophant]

Warp drive.

[Fortlowe]

An entanglement pendulum drive perhaps? Amounts to perpetual motion, which is impossible, but so is the mass effect. Two fields of particles of opposite states. One trapped, or perhaps more accurately, somehow lashed to the ship's drive core and the other programmed to occupy a position in the spacially opposite position you want to go. It's not actually traveling, if the lashing works, so Newtonian stresses would not apply (mass multiplying due to acceleration), nor would the limits of relativity (travel requiring movement through space over time).

Essentially, it's a transporter, except a transporter projects the object from one place to another requiring the transporter be in a fixed position. The Pendulem drive itself changes position carrying the ship in tow.

Time, or rather our old friend relativity is still a hurdle. Not because the pendulum drive isn't objective instant unlimited space travel, but because the position of the observed object, Andromeda, has changed and the observer has no way to objectively predict what position the object will occupy at the moment the drive engages, because the Milky Way, Andromeda, and very likely the space they occupy are all independently moving.

[Pheabus2009]

They travel through the Fade so there's no passage of time.

Finally the DA and ME series have something in common besides disconnection from EA servers.

[Khrystyn]

Optional Ways to Get to Andromeda – pithy humor included:

 

At the end of the final battle in London (ME3), the Tower of London exploded, revealing the largest cache of Eezo underneath. It was King Arthur’s secret wedding gift to Guinevere. When the Salarian STG examined it, it exploded, sending the entire population of earth’s survivors (or planet earth itself and the entire alien armada) zooming across the universe through a gigantic Bose-Einstein condensate to Andromeda.

 

An unfortunate causation of miss-wiring a Mass Relay because no one had a fricking clue about how to rebuild it, or no one read the repair manual left uncovered in the Prothean digsite on Mars. Or, when a Mass Relay was rebuilt, someone had the foolhardy idea of installing a new travel ‘option’. 

 

Lost in Space, thanks to an evil and incompetent Krogan scientist, who the great-great-great grandson of Dr. Zachary Smith.

 

The Mass Relay monument on the Citadel is also the Milky Way’s end of an intergalactic worm hole, that the Star Kid never told  Shepard about. It is one of his previously failed ‘solutions’ to save intelligent life from their synthetic creations.  Andromeda is the other sandbox. 

 

The Star Child is actually from Andromeda. He blinked his eyes, tapped his shoes, and said, “There’s no place like home…”  And all the relocated races have to meet the Star Child’s psychotic parents, who will have to atone for the sins of their wayward son.

 

The Citadel Keeper’s idea of playing a practical joke that went horribly side-ways.

 

The entire Citadel in the Milky Way has an exact doppelganger for the Citadel in Andromeda space.

 

Someone tried to disassemble a Keeper – the idiot.

 

The ‘Dark Matter Effect’ A tsunamic wave of interstellar dark matter, that accidently accompanied the Reaper invasion  to earth, washed everyone towards the Andromeda galaxy. Thus, no need for fuel or supplies, and no need to reproduce new generations during a very brief  journey. No one realized it happened until they realized there were no recognizable star constellations.

 

Andromeda IS the parallel dimension for the Milky Way galaxy. All races in the Milky Way have exact pairs in Andromeda, but electrical polarity is reversed and they lead an alternate life.

 

God decided the Milky Way was a lost cause.

[Eelectrica]

Portals! Portals will take us there.

We fire one nearby wall, and fire another portal off in the general direction of the andromeda galaxy and hope we don't step out onto a sun because that could be problematic.

There will be cake on the other side waiting for us. Very nice chocolate cake.

[Zjarcal]

Space magic, I'm ok with that.

[chris2365]

Proper suspension of disbelief lets the reader/viewer/player believe that the magic fits in the world being described.

 

Let me put it this way:  one of my favorite fantasy authors is Brandon Sanderson.  He does magic in a very logical manner, so you understand how the magic works, even though it is in fact "magic" and can't possibly function in the real world.

 

He even has a set of "rules" like Clarke's laws.  His first rule is: "An author's ability to solve conflict with magic is directly proportional to how well the reader understands said magic"  

 

If there's a lore-friendly, rational reason how we're getting to Andromeda, that could make for good storytelling.  If it's just handwaved away with "A Wizard Did It" (like so much of the original trilogy) that's not interesting.  That's contrived.

 

Heck that's why I say ME2 and ME3 damaged ME1.  As not only did they ad more space magic via the Lazarus Project, and such, but they failed to expand on loose ends from ME1, like the Cipher.

 

And this is why I'm afraid intergalactic travel will simply be handwaved away as well.  "It's always a matter of resources"  How am I supposed to take a series seriously when conflict can just be swept away by a Crucible some mysterious discovery that gets the writers out of the corner they painted themselves in?

 

Personally, I seem to have very little issue with continuity, plot holes, contrivances, space magic, etc. Whenever I watch a movie or play a game, I always seem to get swept along in the wave and emotions, to the point where I ignore most plot holes. If I come to the forums and see them pointed out, I'm just like ''Ok, I didn't notice that'' and move on. Call me weird, but in real life, I often over analyze and over think things in a rational matter, while in video games and movies, I just shut down and go along for the ride, no matter how many bumps on the road. Guess it sort of balances me out in a way 

 

I'm a very trusting and care-free person in games and movies, and stuff like the Catalyst's dialogue at the end of ME3 just passed over me as I was self-absorbed in the incredible soundtrack, environment and the final decision that awaited me. When people started pointing out the inconsistencies, it never bothered me. I'm actually very ok with the ending we got in ME3. Could it have been better? Of course, like any other part of the game. It most certainly didn't warrant the nuclear explosion that occurred on the internet and especially on BSN, at least from my point of view.

 

But that's my opinion. I can now understand your position quite well. I can now get why you enjoy having a strong core with few holes when it comes to your lore, continuity, etc. Unlike me, maybe you enjoy more how well crafted the world is and how consistent it is with itself. For example, I might not care about how we got to Andromeda, so long as I get the Mass Effect feel, while you are looking for logical links so that everything clicks and works, and that is satisfying for you. I might find that these things are too minor to be of major annoyance, but I can now understand why they might be for you 

[ElitePinecone]

In normal space you don't have to keep the drive running all the time, after all - once you build up speed you'll keep going until you decelerate or hit something that slows you down. So I guess the FTL drive doesn't just propel the ship forwards, it actually keeps it in FTL and thus builds up charge. If you could keep the ship in FTL by some other mechanic which didn't build up charge it would solve your problem. Hell, there might already be something like that but it's seen as impractical, unsafe or outright suicidal. If the FTL drive has to run to keep you in FTL you can drop out by shutting it off. If it didn't, but you had to do something to get out it could lead to problems if you had taken damage.

 

Yeah, this is right.

 

The FTL drive is actually a completely separate piece of technology to the engines. The FTL drive just generates a powerful mass effect field that lowers the mass of the ship enough for it to move faster than light once the engines engage. The engines don't necessarily need to be activated once the ship is at its highest speed, because inertia will just keep pushing it forward (assuming the FTL bubble is still there), but at some point they will need to be used to slow the ship down. 

 

This method of FTL relies on the ship being at an extremely low mass (or negative mass, I guess, because faster than light travel should violate the laws of physics??), so I don't think it would necessarily work without a mass effect core.

 

But something in the Reaper mass effect cores prevents the creation and/or discharge of static electricity, and that's all that would needed to be copied in order to achieve basically unlimited FTL travel. 

 

Alternatively, using a conventional drive they could just dump the static electricity into parts of the ship that are gradually dropped into space, like giant metal ballast. We know that space stations have facilities for ships to discharge, and the games never actually specify how long it takes before the electricity builds to a level that would harm the ship or its crew. 

[Vapaa]

Enough technobabble, that's how the MEverse works.

 

The key aspect is to make sure the new technobabble doesn't contradict too much the old technobabble.

[Han Shot First]

They are going to tech the tech.

 

[Morty Smith]

Expect the question "What´s a reaper?" from your spacefaring andromeda neighbours that are just as technologically advanced as hoominz.

[United_Strafes]

A super car? Who cares it's science fiction.

[Iakus]

Personally, I seem to have very little issue with continuity, plot holes, contrivances, space magic, etc. Whenever I watch a movie or play a game, I always seem to get swept along in the wave and emotions, to the point where I ignore most plot holes. If I come to the forums and see them pointed out, I'm just like ''Ok, I didn't notice that'' and move on. Call me weird, but in real life, I often over analyze and over think things in a rational matter, while in video games and movies, I just shut down and go along for the ride, no matter how many bumps on the road. Guess it sort of balances me out in a way 

 

I'm a very trusting and care-free person in games and movies, and stuff like the Catalyst's dialogue at the end of ME3 just passed over me as I was self-absorbed in the incredible soundtrack, environment and the final decision that awaited me. When people started pointing out the inconsistencies, it never bothered me. I'm actually very ok with the ending we got in ME3. Could it have been better? Of course, like any other part of the game. It most certainly didn't warrant the nuclear explosion that occurred on the internet and especially on BSN, at least from my point of view.

 

But that's my opinion. I can now understand your position quite well. I can now get why you enjoy having a strong core with few holes when it comes to your lore, continuity, etc. Unlike me, maybe you enjoy more how well crafted the world is and how consistent it is with itself. For example, I might not care about how we got to Andromeda, so long as I get the Mass Effect feel, while you are looking for logical links so that everything clicks and works, and that is satisfying for you. I might find that these things are too minor to be of major annoyance, but I can now understand why they might be for you 

And, if it was an entirely new IP, without the N7 logo or the "Mass Effect" title, I could just go with it.  New universe, new rules for how the magic works.

 

But because it takes up the mantle of the Mass Effect series, it's taking up a preset lore.  There are certain things that should or should not be possible (or at the very least, will require explanations for same) simply by virtue of being "Mass Effect"

[dreamgazer]

They are going to tech the tech.

 

 

"CAPTAIN, THE TECH IS OVER-TECHING."

[Saul Iscariot]

A super car? Who cares it's science fiction.

Imagine Doc Brown turns up and says, 'Wait you ain't Marty, I guess I've got time to sort out your problems now I'm here.'

[UKStory135]

To me, it would be much more bizarre in this SciFi universe if there WASN'T a similar Mass Relay type system on Andromeda.  The Reapers are millions of years old, the travel time to Andromeda is a fraction of the 50,000 years. Why wouldn't they settle there, too?

[azarhal]

 

But something in the Reaper mass effect cores prevents the creation and/or discharge of static electricity, and that's all that would needed to be copied in order to achieve basically unlimited FTL travel. 

 

Alternatively, using a conventional drive they could just dump the static electricity into parts of the ship that are gradually dropped into space, like giant metal ballast. We know that space stations have facilities for ships to discharge, and the games never actually specify how long it takes before the electricity builds to a level that would harm the ship or its crew. 

 

Static discharge isn't just a "FTL core" issue. It's a problem right now with Moon and Mars probes because of the lack of atmosphere, but NASA already found a solution.

[In Exile]

And, if it was an entirely new IP, without the N7 logo or the "Mass Effect" title, I could just go with it. New universe, new rules for how the magic works.

But because it takes up the mantle of the Mass Effect series, it's taking up a preset lore. There are certain things that should or should not be possible (or at the very least, will require explanations for same) simply by virtue of being "Mass Effect"

Sure. That's absolutely true. But I'm not sure the complaints are as yet justified since they haven't said anything about when we're in Andromeda, much less how we got to it.

[Spacepunk01]

To me, it would be much more bizarre in this SciFi universe if there WASN'T a similar Mass Relay type system on Andromeda.  The Reapers are millions of years old, the travel time to Andromeda is a fraction of the 50,000 years. Why wouldn't they settle there, too?

 

Yeah, I've made this argument several times, in multiple threads.

 

Hyper-advanced AI wouldn't neglect the opportunity to expand their operations. Increasing the number of crop fields would also increase the chance of success. We know that AI will always look for ways to optimize its efficiency. The harvest would become more efficient if they owned two galaxies, rather than just one.

 

The Reapers had access to so much energy that they could've constructed a relay system in the Andromeda galaxy. The Reapers already resides in dark space, a considerable distance from the Milky Way. There is no way they wouldn't have sent a scout party to Andromeda.

 

..or are we saying that machines can become complacent?

[trevelyan_shep]

It's going to be some grade A space magic and a few hands waving. 

 

EDIT: I also expect a gigantic slingshot to shoot them through space.

[Iakus]

Sure. That's absolutely true. But I'm not sure the complaints are as yet justified since they haven't said anything about when we're in Andromeda, much less how we got to it.

Call it suspicion based on past performance.

 

The Lazarus Project was "a matter of resources"

The entire logic behind thermal clips and how they are found everywhere, including places where they shouldn't exist.

The smoothifying process for the Reapers distilling "the essence of a species" (whatever the hell that is)

The Cipher defining what it means to be Prothean

The functions of the Crucible were all ludicrous, but Synthesis being a matter of "organic essence" really took the cake.

[Paridave]

Sure. That's absolutely true. But I'm not sure the complaints are as yet justified since they haven't said anything about when we're in Andromeda, much less how we got to it.

I suspect most of the rules are going to be the same.  I expect there to be relays, however in Andromeda they will have been built by the Remnants, as well as Element Zero.  I don't expect to see things directly related to Shephard's story, such as Reapers or Reaper technology sort of like 'what happens in the Milky Way stays in the Milky Way.'