Did Geth Heretics ever really exist?

I really wouldn't be so opposed to it if it wasn't so hamfisted and forced. Ignore billions massacred, Quarians bad Geth good. 

If you believe that this is remotely simple, we can stop discussing right now.

On topic: I had a parallel discussion about a similar topic elsewhere and thinking about this... if the geth are spared on Rannoch, a juggernaut approaches Shepard and says that they are now ready to join fighting Reapers. If the quarians also live, he welcomes them to make some use of the land that laid barren while the geth sat on the planet. And this is pretty much the opposite of geth, heretic or not, behavior before Legion. What I'm aiming for is that I believe that this difference in behavior cannot be simply explained by the changes in their metaphysics, Legion had to give them some different thinking. And if so, he thought somewhat different to the rest. Probably changed his mind somewhere after his statement about those who'd "interfere" with the geth's plans.

Btw. "true geth" is the new "true Scotsman", "orthodox" is a better term.

I'm a big critic of Bioware's handling of the geth/quarians as well. Ultimately what bothers me about it is that Bioware handles it in a very one-sided and shallow way. By portraying the quarians in such a belligerent and cartoonish way the writers trivialize a very big and serious question that arises with the development of AI. This also contradicts the rest of the series, which treats the creation and possible dangers of AI very seriously. I think a much more interesting and nuanced story could have been told in which the quarian leadership acted in a logical manner in an effort to protect their people, with the resultant slaughter being an unintended result that they'd been trying to avoid. The geth needn't be demonized for this either though; as a new form of life born by accident we could explain their behavior as the result of ignorance; the geth had no concept at time of genocide, or controlled war, no system of ethics, no ability to empathize, ect... This would bring home the real horror of what happened; it was all an accident. The quarians didn't intend to birth a new race of synthetic beings and those beings were themselves reacting out of base instinct with no real comprehension of what they were doing.

Instead Bioware just makes it about mean old quarians being fanatically anti-geth to the point they genocided themselves apparently? It's so dumb. I don't know why more people can't see this.

I'll shill my thread about the geth here again too: bsn.boards.net/thread/16684/geth-deserve-sympathy?page=1j



Edit:

Regarding Legion lying about the existence of the Heretics; I think our visit to the apparent Heretic base during his loyalty mission pretty effectively proves that the Heretic/geth division does exist. Why else would Legion take us there to rewrite or destroy those geth? My issue with Legion isn't that I think he's a liar but rather that the writers don't give us the proper dialog options to actually challenge him on anything or really pick his brain about his people and their historic acts of hostility.


Such a huge missed opportunity.

That is one of the crucial points I made. Legion was an anomaly, there are no heretics, only Legion and the rest of the Geth. Him taking you there is consistent with that, they are an obstacle to his goals. If Real Geth and Heretics existed there'd be no need for Legion VI or Legion himself to be hooked up into the Dreadnought. 

All they had to do for me to make it better and keep the morally grey was make it so the Geth didn't let the Quarians go. That single action shows they understood what they did but let them go anyways because Geth good and Quarians bad.

There is not a single society in history that can mobilize entire population and fights until 1 in 580 survives. 

Something also forgotten is a little tidbit revealed in the second novel; the Migrant Fleet is dying. They have another century or so before one of their liveships dies and with that goes at least a third of their remaining population. ME2 explains that settling the homeworld could free the quarians for their suits in a few decades but that another planet would take centuries. During all the time the quarian species will be vulnerable and as long as they are confined in suits their population growth will be stunted. As well, it is a risk to settle any planet while the geth remain at large. At no point have the geth given any indication they are peaceful and especially after the events of ME1 it is evident that they are capable of going on the attack beyond their own region of space. Thus there is a good military reason to take back the homeworld and at the same time eliminate the threat of the geth forever.


Edit: as well it makes sense that the quarians would decide that the best time to do this is when the Reapers attack for the simple reason that if they help fight the Reapers they will lose some of their strength and will thus have great odds against them in recapturing their homeworld. From the perspective of the Admiralty the Migrant Fleet is only going to get weaker over time so either they take back their world now or never. Either Reapers drive them to extinction now or the galaxy itself grinds them down to extinction in the coming decades and centuries. The only worthwhile future for them is one in which they have their homeworld back and can restart their civilization.

Another note, does anyone notice the irony in Han'Gerrel wanting to blow up the geth dreadnaught with Shepard still on it in ME3? During Tali's loyalty mission in ME2 when you come back form the Alerai if you stop and listen to the proceedings in the courtroom for a minute before going in you can overhear Zal'Koris suggest opening fire on the Alerai. He presumes that Shepard and Tali are dead and that the fleet should just blow up the ship without investigating further. It's odd how he and Gerrel switched roles in ME3.

Is there any evidence that they started only after learning about the Reaper invasion?

And yet they undercut that entire logic by the use of Geth to reprogram their suits to speed up the adaption process. That means the entire immune system being negatively effected by the overly sterile environments complaint doesn't mean anything. And that they wouldn't need to wear suits in the Fleet only when they would leave the Fleet would they have to suit up.