The litmus test

Yes I have. I've got platinum trophies the trilogy. First run is my personal choices which are usually paragon 90% of the time. Second run is always the polar opposite complete renegade choices for trophy and see what happens with opposite actions.  3rd and onward are what ever I feel like mixing and matching.

Not to mention that was one of the early complaints about the game that you had to play MP to actually get good ending if you didn't take the paths that maximized your war assets. And the path that maximizes your war assets is generally paragon choices. If you have all DLC downloaded regardless of how paragon or renegade you are if you complete it all it will give you enough points for the good ending version of any of your choices. Turning the MP side of ME 3 from not so optional to play to completely optional to play.

But they had to do it a lot less.

If you have something to say simply say it. I'm sure you enjoy yourself but we don't really get anywhere.  If you want to call me an idiot and say why I am one then just do it. It saves a lot of time in the long run to be honest about what you think.  I have made it abundantly clear in the past I have absolutely no problem with people calling me a fucking moron if they think I am one.  We both know you will only continue to respond to me as long as you think I'm wrong in some capacity. The second you no longer think I'm wrong you will close up tighter then a miser's purse.

War Assets and Galactic Readiness combine to determine the player's overall Effective Military Strength (EMS) rating. The total number of War Assets obtained by the player represents potential Military Strength. If Galactic Readiness is at 100%, then the player's EMS will be 100% of all available War Assets. If Galactic Readiness is at 50%, the lowest level it can fall to, then the player's EMS will be reduced by 50% as well.

masseffect.wikia.com/wiki/Mass_Effect_3:_Galaxy_at_War

There are 8370 total War Assets available in the game without downloadable content, but this number cannot be reached as it includes War Assets that are restricted to specific outcomes of player decisions, including saving Kaidan Alenko or Ashley Williams, saving or sacrificing the Citadel Council, and spreading or sabotaging the genophage cure. As such, the highest obtainable War Assets score is approximately 7500. If the multiplayer mode is not played, the player will only be able to acquire ~3750 EMS, which is less than the ~4000 EMS necessary to experience all possible endings.

Downloadable content for Mass Effect 3 significantly affects the War Assets system. Mass Effect 3: Extended Cut lowers the EMS required to achieve all possible endings from ~4000 to 3100. Mass Effect 3: Leviathan features an additional 620 War Assets for the player to obtain, Mass Effect 3: Omega features an additional 405 War Assets, and Mass Effect 3: Citadel adds 70 points to the Alliance Frigate Normandy SR-2 War Asset. The mobile game Mass Effect: Infiltrator also grants up to 120 War Assets if completed.

masseffect.wikia.com/wiki/War_Assets

Just remember to account for DLC points as they are added in with those by default.

Oh then what does it equal?

Well then someone on Wiki team sucks at math. Because it was a direct copy paste from the website. Which is why I included the link to show I was directly copy and pasting from it.  Guess someone should inform them the wiki in this regard.

Though I do suppose the more important question in regards to this topic is does it prove or disprove my assertion correct or incorrect. And since your MO seems to be only talk to me when you think I'm wrong about something and your continuation of this conversation you must continue to think I'm wrong.  So now it is your turn to present your reasoning, facts. etc that leads you to continue to think I'm wrong and thus continue this conversation.

So the massive deaths, starvation, murder and other assorted problems when you destroy the entire infrastructure the galaxy is build on?

Or are you talking about the fairy tale ending that nothing bad happens and everyone gets sunshine and rainbows?

I respond with a firm "Fuck, yes!"  I would risk a lot of people dying throughout the galaxy to insure that the Reapers never again have the opportunity to engage in mass genocide a thousand times over AGAIN.  They don't get a pass and at no point was the Catalyst/Intelligence programmed to engage in this behavior.  For the record, I'd similarly subject the Leviathan to the same sentence.  It's one reason why I would love to have seen a sequel in which we took on and took out the Leviathan - or died trying.

As long as it showed the actual effects like a shuttle full of refugee's trying to escape a planet only for the wave to hit and their engines cut out as they slowly get pulled back into the gravity well of the planet, millions of soldiers on ships slowly dying of CO2 due to lack of air.  Hospitals losing power as countless wounded soilders slowly die of their wounds screaming in agony. Wild fires raging uncontrollably across planets as it shows a father putting his daughter to bed before pulling out a gun and shooting her in the head to spare her the pain of starving to death as he then shoots himself. Showing the Turians and Krogan on Palivan battling relentlessly with sharpen sticks and rocks over what little farming area and food is left after the Reaper attack. Bonus if they actually show Krogan killing, cooking and eating Turians. The entire Quarian race (if chosen/peace) dying either of starvation or their own body's reaction to the unprocessed food they now have to eat with their suits off.  Dreadnoughts impacting onto civilian surviving civilian population centers and detonating in a ball of hell fire wiping out the city. The pillaging, murder and implied rape of people on planets simply fighting to stay alive by any means necessary.

If that was the ending we got a brutal candid showing of what the destroy option really means I would have no problem with a destroy only ending.  Even better if lower endings directly stated that Shepard inadvertently wiped out all current life in the galaxy.  Literally restarting the entire development of life in the galaxy.


But I'd say 90-99% of people who say they prefer destroy ending and would like the game to be destroy only aren't talking about that. What they want is Shepard giving the Finger to Catalyst before riding off on his magical space unicorn as the Crucible fires. Causing all the Reapers to just disappear all the people they killed appear alive again just in time for everyone to have a bitching week long party were the entire galaxy gets drunk and has tons of sex and all problems are now gone for every and ever.


They could continue Mass Effect in the milky way without Shepard anyways even with ending presented in trilogy.  It would how ever require imagination and balls from BioWare. And players not to be so self obsessed. So at best it would have been 1-2 because BioWare at least shows they have some imagination even if they have no spine. But players will be players and enough of them are self obsessed to cause problems. Certainly enough to drastically effect sales and cause that no spine aspect to be worsened.

No. I'd choose destroy even without the possibility of the breath scene. Even in the scenario you're describing, destroy is the only ending that guarantees reapers can't one day decide to start killing all sentient life in the galaxy. If that means sacrificing all the species currently fighting the reapers so that the next cycle is free, so be it.

Nothing we do in our cycle can compare to the crimes the Reapers committed against the previous cycles. Everything up to the end of the game tells you that the Reapers will annihilate everything in this cycle and all future cycles if we don't find a way to beat them. So if sacrificing this cycle insures that future cycles continue to exist, I'm willing to make that sacrifice, yes. I never expected or even wanted a completely happy ending to the trilogy. And all this assumes that you're even correct in saying that the destroy ending leads to a post apocalyptic scenario, which I don't buy.

To me synthesis is the one I would label "the weakest and most pathetic ending in all 4", though that wording is rather extreme; the concept essentially uplifts all the species in the galaxy without their consent, going against one of the themes in the trilogy that a species should be left to determine its own fate. The ending slides go on to imply that everything is all sunshine and rainbows from here on out. It's just not believable to me. Control at least has the possibility of the Shepard AI deciding to continue the destruction the Reapers began at some point in the future and becoming the villain of the next cycle, which I find interesting as a concept.

But really, all the above is my personal opinion. I don't make sweeping generalizations about people who don't choose Destroy.