Mass Effect/Fridge: Difference between revisions

* Also in the sequel, some fans don't like the way your Charm and Intimidate checks are completely tied to your Karma Meters rather than an upgradeable skill. However, it makes a whole lot more sense this way because it means that your reputation is preceding you. If people know you have history of kindness, they are more likely to believe you when you try and charm them. Likewise they are more likely to cower before you if they know what [[Badass|badassery]] you're capable of. Also, it means that every conversation is an opportunity to upgrade your Persuasion skill: a character that always takes a neutral response WILL miss out on a lot of Karma and therefore be unable to orate properly. [[Your Mileage May Vary|It doesn't fix every problem]], but the concept is interesting.

** Also logical in a different way--the Reapers really ''don't'' need more than a handful of Collectors. The way they operate (from the shadows and over very long periods of time) means that it's simply not necessary for there to be many of them. Attacking the Normandy was quite likely the first significant act of aggression the Collectors ever did. (because there was no fighting involved with kidnapping colonies)

* In the first ''Mass Effect'', Saren's goal is to preserve the existence of organic life by proving that it can be of use to the Reapers -- that submission, to paraphrase one of his lines, exists as a preferable alternative to extinction. Naturally, everyone thinks he's crazy, and that the Reapers would wipe out all organic life anyway. It's not until ''[[Mass Effect 2]]'' when you {{spoiler|discover that the Collectors were once Protheans}} that you learn he was ''right'' -- the Reapers would have preserved organic life, {{spoiler|though almost certainly in a very different form than what existed}}. Not only that, but it's likely that Saren KNEW {{spoiler|the true fate of the Protheans}}, which is why he was trying to prove that organic life should be spared {{spoiler|once again}}. Submission really DID exist as an alternative to extinction (though [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?|"just beating the hell out of the Reapers"]] was [[Take a Third Option|obviously better than either of those choices]]).

**** But still consider Saren's point of view--he'd rather they survive ''somehow'' than definitely all die, as from his point of view, there's no possible way for the Reapers to be stopped (and if Shepard wasn't so awesome, there really wouldn't be a way to stop the Reapers. Quite frankly, if the Normandy had been a few hours farther from Eden Prime, the Reapers probably would have already won!).

** To add to that, in ME1 enemies scale up to your level--you're never ''inordinately'' stronger than them, in the sense they're still level-one mooks and you're a level-sixty god. So when you hit ME2, the same occurs: you're still not so much stronger than them that their bullets simply bounce off of your hardened skin weaved flesh, but you are using the best weapons, come equipped with top-of-the-line armor, and still have your combat expertise.

**** Firstly, {{spoiler|the female reproduction system does not work that way. Women don't produce eggs, they're born with a limited number and once they're gone, they're gone. It's why female patients undergoing chemotherapy usually put a few on ice.}} Secondly, we actually have no idea what the neoplasm actually did or where it was located, other than {{spoiler|it made her sterile.}} It may be the only way to fix the problem is for Miranda to have a whole new {{spoiler|reproduction system}} custom-grown for her, which -- even for ''Mass Effect'' -- is probably impossible. In fact, it was probably the reason Oriana was created, and Miranda's father was too much of a [[Complete Monster]] to tell her. -- Medicus

** Thane is also a sniper-- sniping is an excellent defensive fire tactic.

* In the third game, at first I was pissed that certain missions like the Grissom Academy mission become unavailable if you wait too long. Then I realized that it ties into a main theme in the game -- that you can't save everyone, and gives the player the same feeling Shepard has of feeling weak and ineffective if you can't do it in time.

* The [[Grand Finale]] takes a lot of flak, but given enough thought, the entire series has been leading up to those {{spoiler|[[Multiple Endings|Three Possible Endings]]. The Reapers are believed to be a [[Giant Space Flea From Nowhere]], but the [[Exposition Fairy|Catalyst]] points out that to its knowledge, ''every'' civilization falls apart due to failed [[The Singularity|Singularities]]; "[[Turned Against Their Masters|The Created Destroys The Creator.]]" In the previous cycle, the Protheans had the "[[Noodle Incident|Metacore War]]", and the current cycle has managed to do it ''twice''; not only the quarians and the geth, but also the turians/salarians and the krogan(uplifting a species to fight their battles for them and sterilizing them once they rebelled is no different ideologically from creating servants who refused to be turned off - creating life then throwing it away once it becomes troublesome). These wars destroy biospheres, preventing future species from evolving. When Harbinger spoke of being "salvation through destruction", he was right [[From a Certain Point of View]]; they preserve civilizations as data, they preserve worlds from [[Robot War|Robot Wars]]. Once organics became capable of interacting with the Catalyst, that cycle became inherently flawed; the Reapers' network was no longer secure, and would eventually fall, destroying everything the Reapers had preserved. Hence it is left to Shepard what the new solution should be: preventing synthetic life from ever evolving again(by means of making technology impossible), subduing synthetic life so they cannot harm organics, or merging with synthetic life with the hope that interaction would defeat fear.}}

* There's actually a fair bit of logic in the abilities of your squadmates in ME2. Garrus was your Infiltrator swap in ME1, so he has a combat ability and a tech ability. Thane is an assassin, so he has the biotic abilities dedicated to killing people, instead of crowd control. Miranda was bred to be perfect, so she's the only squadmate who can take down all four forms of defence. Mordin is a scientist specializing in organics, so he has the two tech powers useful against organics. Tali grew up with a father who wanted war with the geth, and thus has abilities that take down shields and hack synthetics-- two thinggs very useful in a fight against the geth. {{spoiler|Legion is a geth, so his powers consist of using his many runtimes to either hack other robots or to provide fire support. He's also a sniper, so having a drone to provide crowd control would be very helpful.}} My two favorites however, are Zaeed and Jack. Zaeed has spent most of his life trying to take down the Blue Suns. As any Adept will tell you through gritted teeth, the Blue Suns all use Shields. So, it makes perfect sense that he's the only squad member who can use disruptor ammo, which is specifically designed to take down shields. Jack is the absolute best, so just stay with me. Some people in the ME universe consider biotics to be an evolution of humanity, some kind of higher form of existance (think mutants from X-men). In other words, to use Harbinger's words, biotics are humanity's GENETIC DESTINY. Harbinger constantly taunts Shepard with those particular words, and it is eventually revealed that ''his'' idea for humanity's genetic destiny involves either {{spoiler|being turned into a Reaper or becoming a slave race like the Protheans.}} Jack is the most powerful human biotic in the galaxy. In other words, she has already reached humanity's genetic destiny; she is a higher form of human... sort of. So, whose powers are the absolute best at fighting off the agents of the Reapers? Who is best at preserving humanity's own genetic destiny and staving off the destiny that the Reapers had in mind? Well, with Shockwave (best move for taking down husks) and Warp Ammo (specifically designed to take down barriers, armor and health. If those sound familiar, they are the only form of defence that the Collectors use), Jack is the absolute best squadmate to take on the Collector missions in the game. Hell, Harbinger doesn't even stand a chance against humanity's own genetic destiny.

* Notice the wall designs of Afterlife. Fire holovids. After all, you ''are'' in hell -- literally.

** Garrus--when you first pick him up he's killing people. Not that unusual, except he's probably the only one apart from possibly Thane who's actively killing people while you're getting his quest. Also, {{spoiler|his vigilante name is Archangel.}}

** Mordin--an elderly doctor who kills people. Kind of a paradox.

** Jack--has an enormous omega symbol on her back.

** Grunt--tying into the life theme, Grunt is the youngest squadmember, and he's practically a child compared to the other krogan Shepard meets.

** Thane--a dying assassin with a young son.

** The krogans and the quarians--both races trying to restore (to resurrect?) themselves.

** The Reapers in general--the ultimate death dealers, but it seems that {{spoiler|they kill to create life.}}

* I absolutely hated how, in a sci-fi setting, humans were always the most genetically diverse while all the other alien species were homogeneous to the point that the only true physical differences (if any) were between males and females. The explanation for this was usually [[Hand Wave|Hand Waved]] as humans couldn't tell them apart. Then I read ''[[Mass Effect]]: Ascension'' which offered an explanation so brilliant and so obvious that I don't know how I never saw it before: It's an accepted theory that the discovery that one is not alone in the universe would have the effect of uniting the entire species into one group instead of nation states and ethnicity. However, the consequence of this would be that, over time, all ethnic groups would eventually blend into a select few if not one. Since humanity is frequently the newcomer in the galaxy, this has yet to happen to them.

* Mordin describes the genophage in detail: it essentially rewires glands in the bodies of krogan females that control fetal growth, causing deformities that are lethal to 999/1000 of the resulting offspring - the genetic equivalent of [[wikipedia:Teratology#Teratogenesis|teratogenesis]] I.E. ''thalidomide babies.'' That seems a pretty sick thing for a matriarchal society to do to someone, until you think hard about salarian civilization; males compete for the right to sire progeny on females, and females barter breeding rights as the sorce of their authority - ''[[Not So Different|just like post-genophage krogan.]]'' Salarian females ''aren't'' [[Mama Bear|Mama Bears]]. Given the rarity of salarian females and how salarians consider science their most potent weapon, wouldn't a Dalatrass screwing up a rival female's ability to bear offspring be the equivalent of ''[[Realpolitik|America nuking Hiroshima?]]''

**** Also, the 12 LY/d is not a sustainable velocity. In addition to how fast ships gulp down fuel during non-mass-relay interstellar travel, there's the problem that you have to dump the drive core's static charge every 50 hours, which means you are making stops in systems with suitable large planetary bodies (and not all are suitable) every dozen or so light-years. Across hundreds of thousands of light-years of space that was never fully charted because Citadel society's expansion throughout the galaxy is in a bunch of star clusters tightly grouped around mass relay exit points, not evenly distributed across the galactic map. You can no more hope to cross the galaxy in 'only' 22 years for the same reasons that a jeep capable of doing 60 mph could hope to drive the width of the Sahara Desert (approx. 3000 mi) in 'only' 50 hours, only the galaxy is a million times worse. Now, the ''Reapers'' can do it, but that's because they don't have any fuel limits, endurance limits, or need to dump drive core static charge... you ain't a Reaper, and if it took the Turians two years to figure out how to make a Thanix cannon from dead Reaper parts, I don't think you're going to be re-engineering Reaper FTL drive fast enough to get the quarians home before they starve to death, especially not with all the devastation you're ''already'' dealing with.

** It sort of makes sense if you consider that Shepard's interactions with AI in the first game were largely negative. The heretic geth were essentially at war with the Alliance (at were thought to represent all geth instead of a small minority), the AI on the Citadel (which tried to blow itself up, killing Shepard and “as many organics as I can”), the rogue AI on Luna and now Sovereign, a literal [[Omnicidal Maniac]]. It’s not unreasonable to assume that Shepard though all AI were [[Always Chaotic Evil]]. But interactions with EDI, Legion and the true geth over the next two games probably changed his/her opinions.