One thing I hate about discussing the trilogy in general

Yea considering Joker's personality that half way across the galaxy and hit a target the size of a pin head statement can only be taken as his over exaggeration due to Nihilus's comment.  The galaxy map they gloss over connections true enough but never really saw them altering their logic constantly.


Fairly certain they establish that Relays need to be kept in place by a gravity well of a planet or star system. But the entire concept that was created in ME 1 with the Citadel being a giant mass Relay needed to get the Reapers into the galaxy was poorly thought out and comes across as a last minute addition to the game lore.  That being said all Relays lead to the Citadel so the Reapers jumping from the Alpha right to the Citadel would put them at the heart of the Relay system and allow them to spread to every corner of the galaxy from there.

The plot of ME1 is bad because it undermines itself.  The plot of ME2 is bad because it just totally departs from the plot of ME1.  The plot of ME3 is bad because it rests on the foundation of two bad previous plots that don't fulfill the purposes of the first and second installments of a "proper" literary Trilogy.  To just criticize ME3 and blame it for everything is, quite frankly, an unfair criticism of that particular game.  I am really tired of this forum taking the general stance that's it's OK to criticize ME3 mercilessly, but not OK to even suggest that ME1's plot has some serious flaws that contribute to the ending failure of ME3 (by not setting up the situation coherently as a truly "good" first installment would) every bit as much as the failure to set up the endings properly within ME3 itself.

It's not my job to work up "explanations" for the holes not explained in ME1.  As the first installment of a Trilogy, it was ME1's job was to present the situation coherently enough that I shouldn't have to do that at all.  The questions I asked above were questions up to ME1 to explain... it didn't.  ME2's job was to advance the plot... it didn't.  ME3's job was to pick up where ME2 left off and bring up whatever finale was set up by the situation in ME1... it tried... and it really didn't have much chance of success of doing that (regardless of who writes it).  That is, I haven't yet seen a decent fan fiction that can pick up from the first two games and present a spectacular ending in it's own right (even by completely ignoring ME3).  Yet, they'll continue to blast ME:A for trying to do even just that.

^ the only thing that might explain the shifting lines is the shifting state of the galaxy itself. It is pretty likely the mass relays are drifting about, maybe even orbiting a system's parent star. This would mean the relay "connections" would change slightly depending on those fluctuations.

Thoughts?

I also wondered about the whole "primary and secondary" thing when I was playing the games. I think its one of those things that was changed gamewise, but slipped into the codex nonetheless. Otherwise I can't explain why they work completely differently than they are described.

I don't think this has been proven. I agree with you about ME2. I find this third statement interesting because it pins blame for ME3 solely on the previous entries. Do you really believe there are no intrinsic flaws? Or it this a sort of rebalancing effort for what you perceive as unfair? Because even if I go by what you say the things you point out hardly justify the forced nonsense of ME3. What does the Conduit and its usefulness or uselessness have to do with the holokid or its "art" or the Crucible asspull or Shepard being the Space Jesus Errand Boy or anything really? You harp on the Conduit like it's the source for everything wrong with the world where in reality, even if I agree with you it's one mistake, and not a fundamental one at that.

I haven't seen you trying to pick apart the stacked odds of the Reapers, one of which can nearly solo the combined might of everyone persented, who also have a backdoor right at the heart and mind of society and who they've also been Palpatining for millenia. I haven't seen you complain about how they went straight for the nigh-cosmic threat instead of trying to build the world first and build up a reasonable scale of villain threat. Where's the critique of clashing themes and the fundamental incompatibility of what they tried to do with Shepard (power fantasy) vs the Reapers (pseudo Lovecraftian cosmic horror)? They literally set up an unstoppable force vs an immovable object. These are the real problems ME1 set up that the other two had to deal with (with ME2 just buggering off for a holiday and leaving ME3 with the bag). This is why ME3 was put into an impossible situation (not that this entirely excuses the very real problems it had). The Conduit is nothing. It's a MacGuffin.

ME1 as a standalone works just fine. As the first installment of the series it has issues, but those issues are along the lines of what I listed above and are the result of poor (or no) planning for the trilogy as a whole, not the plot of any one game. Things like the Conduit are peanuts.

As for ME-A I support the concept. I was skeptical they could do a sequel type game given the scorched earth they left behind but against all odds they found a way. I'm wary that they don't seem to be utilizing the idea to its fullest, preferring to simply use it for a scenery change and go back to doing more of the same. But hopefully I'm wrong on that.

Based on... what exactly? The actual timed conduit run? Cutscenes? Those can be misleading. Also you're ignoring that Saren didn't go up on the Conduit by himself but rather brought a sizeable number of geth with him. Also, Saren doesn't initially open the arms, he prevents them from closing. And based on the cutscene he had to go to Citadel Control to do that. So it's possible the initial control for the arms was in Citadel Control. Makes sense, given its function and that the Council isn't up in the tower 24/7 nor are they reasonably expected to be the ones actually on guard for a crisis at all hours. So Saren arrives on the Presidium with a shitload of geth, has to storm C-Sec HQ because that's where Citadel Control is, transfer control to the tower, get back to the tower and prepare for Sovereign's arrival, closing the arms behind him. Meanwhile Shepard arrives at the Presidium and has to do some fighting of his own before finally getting to the tower where Saren's been waiting for a while.

Seems like more than a few minutes to me. And even a few minutes play out differently in heavily armed combat based on how many troops your bring. The point is Saren needed a lot of backup to do what he did and he couldn't have gotten them there any other way. He still fucked up by attacking Eden Prime instead of using deception to steal the beacon before Shepard even got there. But the search for the Conduit fits.

Took what I said a bit to literally with the all relays lead to the Citadel.

Considering were most organic life seems to develop the Citadel being the starting point of the invasion seems like a fairly intelligent spot to start. From there they can spread to the major areas and quickly block off a quarter to half the galaxy. Pushing them further into less settled territory.

Technically, doesn't that really mean that there is a way for all relays to lead to all relays?  (A network.)  The disconnect though starts right at Arcturus - which is described as being a Prime Relay.  On this diagram, it appears to only connect to the Exodus Cluster, a jump far shorter though than many of the jumps shown between numerous obviously secondary relays on the map.  Also, that should mean that there are 2 relays in the Exodus Cluster, one primary one that connects only to the Arcturus prime relay and one other that would enable it to connect to the Local Cluster and the other secondary relays nearby (within a few hundred LY).  Then, lets look at some of the other jumps.  The distance between the Horsehead Nebula and the Hawking Eta Cluster is obviously more than a few hundred LY.  Why is that jump being handled by secondary relays (since both are clearly shown connect to multiple other relays as well)? 

It seems obvious to me that what the person writing the codex entry was contemplating a system with clear long range, primary relay jumps and clearly short secondary relay jumps... but the person who drafted the galaxy map had a completely different vision.  They also apparently turned the Attican Traverse into the fattest-on-record "border" between Eden Prime and the Terminus Systems... or Anderson just never learned how to read the galaxy map.  Hmmm... might be the real reason Shepard replaced him on Normandy.

Well...Nevermind then. I actually agree with you, there was plenty cross-companion interaction in ME1. Hope that returns in Andromeda tbh. (There was a lot of that in ME3 though too. So they should at least keep it at that level.)

Yes, but I would much rather have it in cutscenes than those static placements across the ship like in ME3. I did like it, but BioWare NPCs feel so static. They feel the most alive to me when they're animated in cutscenes otherwise the magic sort of breaks for me. Just sounds like I'm listening to audio files and looking at a still image.

We know that Saren was not yet on the Citadel during the moments Shepard was talking to Vigil and it is implied that Saren goes directly to the Master Control Unit because Vigil says after one of our squad mates asks about where to find the Master Control Unit:

"Through the Conduit.  Follow Saren.  He will lead you to your destination..... The one you call Saren has not reached the Conduit.  Not yet.  There is still hope if you hurry."

That clearly means that the ONLY difference in the amount of time between Saren arriving on the Citadel and Shepard must be ONLY the length of the Trench Run on Ilos.  If you want to believe it took Shepard hours to make that run, you can; but I'm inclined to agree that it most likely took minutes rather than hours.

Earlier in that conversation, Shepard indicates that Saren "can use the Conduit to override the Citadel's external defense systems." and Vigil responds that he is "Correct."  This means there is absolutely no need for Saren to go to Citadel Control to prevent the Citadel arms from closing.  He can override that from the Master Control Unit... same place he where he can then transfer the control of the Citadel over to Sovereign.  However, this particular line of Shepard's is poorly written and does contradict what was just discussed with Vigil about the Conduit just being a back door.  As a back door, the only thing Saren can do with the Conduit is access the Citadel.  He can't use it directly to override the Citadel's systems.

Furthermore, the most sensible thing for Saren to have done immediately upon reaching the Citadel would have been to destroy the Conduit itself... particularly if he had hours in which to do so.

Agree... I'm quite willing to stick to the arguments (see above post where I'm back to that); and I am treating this as a formal debate where I have chosen an opposing side to the "general trend."  Please also do the same and refrain from accusations of "blaming solely" when the statement clearly does not do that as those can possibly turn nasty as well.