Yeah, I was fond of it too. I went back to do some browsing and found it gone.
Was there a discussion, vote, or even just a reason given for the deletion? If there was, I do not know of it.
I don't see why it was deleted - many other franchises and works use the Characters page for non-character entities, such as War Hammer 40000 using the Character tab for its various factions (Eldar, Tau, Imperium, etc.)
You can view the article in the history tab:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/article_history.php?article=Characters.MassEffectRaces
We have a dispute over use of the Dude, Where's My Respect? trope in regards to humanity:
Original version:
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: When humans actually are deserving of their merits, the other races are rather hesitant to award them. Largely because they just don't understand why humanity couldn't just wait their turn and make themselves useful like everyone else. Who do they think they are? It's taken most other races thousands of years—if ever—to earn the same privileges, but humanity expedites the process by emulating the successes of previous races.
CPF Mfan's version:
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: Completely inverted. Humanity gets a Council spot for helping to win one battle. Contrast the turians, who had to fight a century-long war and had several of their planets flat-out destroyed by a genocidal enemy before they were awarded a Council seat. Understandably, many non-humans are angry about the favoritism they get from the Council. In the batarians' case, the anger eventually grew into genocidal hatred, and by 2 there are politicians who are openly running on the platform that they will put the humans back in line.
So here's my take on it. It's a plot point in Mass Effect 1 and Mass Effect 2 that humans were meeting a lot of resistance in their expansion efforts. The Citadel granted humankind a lot of concessions, but largely with a half-hearted cynicism that they'd actually succeed at it. When they do succeed, humans are met with snide derision and resentment because other races had to wait longer to do the same, if not longer. During the course of the game, human successes are concessions, not acknowledgements.
In Mass Effect 2, humans are given a Council seat but the councilor states he actually has very little power to influence the other three. Humans take over C-Sec, but mostly because they "have the most experienced bodies". And even then, there's accusations that the whole thing is a human conspiracy. David Anderson, if Councilor, flat out tells you that basically nothing's changed.
In a neutral game, the aliens are outright hostile about it. In a Paragon game, they accept it but still feel it's awfully sudden. In a Renegade game, the aliens (rightfully) believe humans are making a power play.
None of this adds up, to me, to a "complete aversion". At best it's a zig-zag and at least it's being played straight. The trope is that a heroic person (or race, in this case) does something impressive, heroic or badass and gets granted any favor they want because of it. That is NOT the case for humanity. At best, they got a council seat, but it amounts to little more than lip service.
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The only resistance humanity is meeting is from random raiders. The Council itself is ridiculously favorable towards humanity, handing them the win in a territorial dispute against a long-established power.
Anderson can say whatever he wants, but the fact of the matter is that humanity now holds 1/4 of galactic power from barley doing anything. Given that politicians are openly running on a "we'll curb human power" platform, humanity's influence there is very real. Even if it wasn't, a ceremonial Council seat is far more than they deserve.
The trope is when a heroic and/or badass character does something great and gets no respect. This is not the case for humanity. They show up, breaking Citadel law, and fight a skirmish with the main military power of Citadel Space but they get saved from being utterly crushed in the nick of time by the asari. They nearly instantly win territorial disputes with long established powers for no reason. They help win one battle and get a Council seat for it when other species had to fight hundred-year wars. This is despite the fact that humanity can't even defend its own colonies, and so should have no right to be granted similar status to the three galactic super powers, the power of even one of which drastically dwarfs humanity. Nowhere is humanity not given what it deserves; if anything, it's given way more than it deserves.
This is part of my annoyance with the way this wiki treats the ME humans. It tends to drastically overestimate their power and importance.
Edited by CPFMfan ...
The problem I have with your argument is that it emphasizes a comparison between how long humanity took to achieve their goals versus earlier species. Yes, humans gained more political power in a short amount of time than the other races, but this is largely due to concession than reward. Humanity is the equivalent of the galaxy Rules Lawyer: you tell them the rules, and then they game the system to bend it to their desires. However, where this trope comes into play is that even after they do this, most other species (and the Council) basically say "Good job with that. Now scram." Yes, humans are ambitious any whiny little bastards, but quite often, they truly are not given credit for their accomplishments, even when they EARN them
Humanity gains its Council seat largely because the Council would've ceased to exist if they hadn't (in one ending, they just seize it). The turians earned their seat after a long war because the Krogan Rebellions were not a decisive threat against Citadel government, but were a disastrous menace against its colonies. There's also the fact that, as I said in my entry, humanity had the benefit of coming in millennia after the political system had settled, because they were able to model their success on the political climate. When the turians were around, there was no "we did this to earn a council seat" standard.
Next, you are grossly inflating the faults of humanity and minimalizing its virtues, particularly in regards to the First Contact War. Humans only "broke the law" in that incident because they didn't know there was one to begin with. And besides that, both the salarians AND the asari did much, MUCH worse. Humans likely would have been crushed in a full-scale bout with the turians, but we'll never know how badly it would have gotten, particularly since humans don't fight wars of attrition, and you don't need to outfight an army to win a war against it.
And what's this about human's "can't defend their own colonies"? It's flat out stated in the Codex that the ONLY human world ever captured by an alien force (pre-Collectors) was Shanxi, and that was ONLY because humanity had never met aliens before to that point. And during the Collector attacks, it was only planets in the Terminus, far out of Alliance jurisdiction, that were captured, and considering the Collectors' level of technology, you can't blame them for that. The only world attacked by pirates and raiders are those in the traverse, where pirates and raiders SPECIFICALLY target humans for being the only species with the balls to colonize there.
If you're annoyed with something, it shouldn't be reflected in your edits.
Edited by KingZeal
How are they not given enough credit for their tiny actions? I just listed several examples of them getting way too much credit.
The krogan were not a threat against the Citadel? You might want to tell them to the turians' home systems, which got bombarded by krogan dreadnoughts. Or Menae, which was attacked by krogan. Defeating the krogan was a WAY bigger deal than helping to win one battle; billions died in the krogan rebellions, whereas I doubt the amount of people killed in the whole Citadel-Geth War broke a hundred thousand. Humanity helped win one battle. It was no skill or power on their part, their fleet just happened to be in the right place at the right time to soak up all of the fame, even though the other species had been fighting the battle longer and suffered more casualties.
It's made very apparent that humanity is by far the weakest Citadel race. And against an asteroid-happy enemy with thousands of years of space combat experience and a navy that outnumbered humanity by over 100 to 1? An enemy whose homeworld you don't even know the location of? An enemy who can simply swarm your main relay with thousands of ships? Humanity would've been crushed in a week, if that. We just got lucky and got bailed out.
When I said it can't defend its colonies, I meant from raiders and pirates. And geth. Raids on human colonies are very common things. By contrast, we never hear of a turian, salarian, or asari colony getting attacked. This is because A. they're much more powerful and B. they're not idiots. Colonizing an area where hundreds of thousands of your people are likely to get murdered isn't brave, it's idiotic. Also Alliance =/= humanity.
Except when what I'm annoyed by relates to what I'm editing. This page has a lot of examples of humanity's importance and power being exaggerated, and this is one of them. They did very little to earn their seat, and the game makes this apparent.
Edited by CPFMfan ...
"Way too much credit" is subjective.
The krogan never threatened to wipe out the Council and decapitate Citadel Space. Even though Sovereign was promoted as a geth ship, from the galaxy's perspective the geth capturing the Citadel would have been one of the most disastrous events in their history. The krogan, as I said, were a very dangerous menace, but they didn't come THAT close to the systematic ruination of Citadel space. Also, keep in mind that having highly maneuverable fleets, capable of providing aid to virtually anyone at any time, is humanity's war hat. Also, keep in mind that it was humanity that even discovered Saren's treachery, found proof of it, and offered one of their own as a Spectre to stop him. The only reason it was "one battle" instead of a genocide war was because humans stopped it before it started. So yeah, that was kind of a big deal.
And like I said, you're speculating on any possible turian-human conflict. Especially since colony drops were in violation of Citadel Space regulations. So, we can just drop that.
We never hear of other turian, salarian or asari world being attacked? Well, for one thing, the Codex never says that human colonies are the only ones attacked. It says "once a year, pirate raids are common"—it doesn't say that this only started AFTER humanity showed up. And even if it did, so what? As I said, humans were specifically singled-out by said raiders and pirates. You also forget that the Council encouraged races to settle in the traverse. It was brave, because humans were willing to take the risk.
And like I said, your personal attitude towards this is showing too significantly in your edits. For example, when editing Humans Are Warriors, you eliminated the ENTIRE entry, instead of just editing it to a neutral and accurate tone. Most of your other edits as of late have been full of anti-human negativity, so you're doing the exact same thing you claim to hate, in the opposite extreme.
Edited by KingZeal
Capturing the Citadel means little next to flat-out obliterating and depopulating several planets. The fact of the matter is that a gigantic horde of hundreds of billions of savages ravaging the galaxy with fleets of dreadnoughts is a much bigger threat than one single fleet. And they didn't come that close to ruination of Citadel Space? Before the genophage, they were about to capture Palaven and had pretty much completely curbstomped the militaries of the asari and salarians. If the turians were never there that war would've been very short. You also act like the humans won that battle alone, when they just swooped in after the battle had already been going on for a while. It's also mentioned that the battle wasn't set around just the Citadel, but also the mass relays in the system, where humanity wasn't involved. All humanity did was be in the right place at the right time to help win one battle. Giving them a Council seat just for that is not giving them less than they deserve. If anything it's giving them far more than they deserve, considering that they have a weaker economy than the elcor and a navy that isn't even a tenth as strong as any of the other three members.
Still not seeing how that was brave. It's not like it's hard for the Council races to settle the area, since their massive navies dwarf humanity's, they just don't want to because they've got plenty of planets. It was belligerent of humanity, but not much else. Hundreds of thousands of human colonists were murdered or enslaved (millions if you count the ones killed during the events of 1 and 2) because, as the Council points out, humans chose to move to dangerous areas without bothering to place defenses or garrisons at their colonies.
It's not anti-human negativity, it's accuracy. While I admit that deleting that entire entry was overzealous, it's hardly the only entry on this wiki that contains inaccurate and exaggerated information about humans in the Mass Effect series. They're by far the weakest Citadel race and that isn't gotten across enough here. It's incredibly annoying.
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Capturing the Citadel means everything. That's why the Reapers were aiming to do it. The Citadel is the center of galactic government and, with the geth's technology, there's no telling how much damage they could do. The krogan caused a lot of damage, yes, but they were not about to destroy all of Council Space with one fell swoop. Bottom line: humans earned their Council seat. What you, personally, feel about the matter is irrelevant.
Having powerful navies doesn't mean it's easy to settle a planet. That's assuming that brute force solves everything. If no civilians are willing to settle there because of the dangers, it doesn't matter how strong your military is. The Council flat out says that the Terminus Systems are dangerous to settle in in the first game. And also, who says humans don't have garrisons? The Codex flat out says that they do. It's just that pirates attack and leave before reinforcements can arrive.
And no, it's not accurate. It's overly negative. Whether they're the "weakest" race by your standards doesn't matter. Your interpretation of them should NOT come across in your editing like it has.
No it doesn't. It's important but it doesn't compare to the krogan overwhelming or obliterating dozens of planets. And yes, they WERE about to destroy all of Council Space. They were right about to curbstomp the asari and salarians until the turians arrive, and a few hundred years later they were ready to overwhelm the turians' home system. Helping to win one battle does not compare to fighting hundreds of years of war and losing tens of billions of your own.
They do have garrisons, but its made a point that human colonies are undermanned because of their strategy of defending their colonies. Said strategy results in many of their colonies being destroyed. And it's not bravery: it's greed and belligerence. The Council doesn't want to settle that area because it would be causing trouble for no reason. Humanity has plenty of planets that haven't even begun to become fully developed yet choose to infringe on a contested area.
That's not my interpretation, that's canon. They are the weakest, with the weakest fleet, the weakest economy, the smallest population, and the least experience in warfare. It's not overtly negative if it's canon.
Edited by CPFMfan ...
Again, you're minimalizing the capturing of the Citadel with the entirety of the Krogan Rebellions. Especially since Saren shut down the relays to the Citadel after gaining control to it. As I said, the only reason there WASN'T a war like the Rebellions was because humans stopped it.
Human colonies being destroyed occasionally does not equal "cannot defend their colonies", especially since NOWHERE is it stated that humans are losing colonies left and right. Hell, aren't humans actually PRAISED for how expansive they are and how much their colonization is succeeding? And like I said, they never state that other races' colonies DON'T get attacked. The Council DOES want to colonize that area, but it's just that no one has bothered. Again, you're now making up stuff that was never said.
And no, it's your interpretation, because it's loaded language. You can flat out say that humans have the smallest population and lowest economy, but calling them the "weakest" race is just bias.
If I may butt in, this entire argument is emblematic of a large problem of this page: it's a giant pissing match between what effectively amounts to fictional species and organizations.
I would vote that we lay off the comparisons in general, because its just boiling down to an argument over who does more and who has more troops, which is frankly getting quite silly. I'm considering just going through and cutting out force-on-force comparisons altogether, because of the constant edit-warring, which I admit, I am a part of.
On the main topic, I would say an entry that reflect both sides of this would work better. For example:
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: Played with. On the one hand, human accomplishments are downplayed, with some species being resentful of human successes, and Fantastic Racism resulting in other species' politicians actually running on anti-human platforms. On the other hand, human accomplishments are relatively small-scale compared with what other species have done, such as the turians' war against the krogan, which earned them a Council seat.
Does this address both sides without being too biased one way or the other?
I saw the Ask The Tropers question and came to help. Personally, I agree with King Zeal. CPFM Fan, a large amount of your information is inaccurate.
There are other reasons why people don't like the fact that humans have a seat on the Council(replay Thane's loyalty mission and listen to the politician's dialogue).
The Council has favored the humans in a dispute before ME1 exactly once (that we know of), and mainly because the human fleets were unaware of the existence of the Council.
Also, several non-human colonies have been attacked in the games, such as Haestrom (Quarian), Noveria (Multiracial) and Arathoht (Batarian).
Furthermore, the entire third act of the first game revolves around the Citadel being key to the Reaper's invasion. Direct quote from the ME Wiki:
"The station is actually an inactive mass relay leading to dark space, designed as an elaborate trap so the Reapers can wipe out the heart of galactic civilization and leadership in a single, devastating strike"
If you want to continue to harp on this issue, we have YMMV.
Edited by IlVit
@Zeal: I'm not downplaying the issue of the Citadel. It's an important space station, but it's still just one space station that more or less just holds a bunch of ambassadors. Comparing helping to win one battle to winning several battles in hundreds of years of war is ridiculous.
It's made apparent that while human colonies are not disappearing left and right until Mass Effect 2 (I never said that they were, by the way), Council colonies getting attacked by raiders is uncommon, and the only reason the humans are getting attacked is because they're choosing to snatch up dangerous land in the Skyllian Verge, resulting in things like Mindoir.
It's also bias to say that humanity isn't given enough "respect" for helping to win one battle. And yes, I can say that they're the weakest; like I said earlier they have the weakest everything and Anderson says that they have the least influence of the four Council races.
The Council still favored a new power over an old one for no real reason. Balak comments on this.
Several non-human colonies have been attacked, but none of them were Council colonies, which is what I'm talking about here. Plus, Haestrom was butchered by the geth 300 years ago, it wasn't attacked by raiders like human ones, so using it to support your claim is rather dishonest.
While Shepard knows that is true, no one else does. No one else even knows that the Reapers exist. To them, it's just a geth fleet attacking a space station. Yet they were given a Council seat, something that took the turians hundreds of years of fighting a genocidal enemy, for helping to win one battle.
@Zaptech: That entry seems to wonder why humans are not given "respect" and then states why they're getting no respect, cancelling itself out. It also doesn't mention the massive amount of disproportionate respect humanity does get.
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There have been Council colonies that have been attacked (Phoros and Hyetiana, both asari, for starters).
Yes, trust the opinion of the genocidal batarian terrorist who tried to kill 4 million people for no reason other than racism. I'm sure his opinions are quite unbiased.
Also, wouldn't it also be bias to say that humanity is given enough "respect" for sacrificing eight ships and several hundred thousand people to save the main hub of the main goverment of the galaxy?
Still, the end of the game's plot revolves around it. Who knows or doesn't know the true nature of the Citadel is inconsequential.
Edited by IlVit
Yes... by the Reapers. There's a HUGE difference between losing a colony to a band of pirates and losing a colony to the most powerful military force in the history of the galaxy at a time where they've basically already conquered the galaxy again.
It's also in the codex. The humans were favored over the batarians on a dispute where they both held equal ground because the Council was biased in favor of the humans.
Eight ships is nothing (even though they lost more than that according to the war asset descriptions in 3, it's canon that the turians lost more because they actually fought the bulk of the battle). Also, they didn't lose hundreds of thousands of people, that's false.
Yes, it's very consequential. Humanity got awarded for helping to win one battle.
Edited by CPFMfan ...
None of that matters. The trope isn't about how much someone accomplished compared to someone else. It's bout accomplishments being ignored or resented. Doesn't matter how many greater accomplishments there were.
It doesn't change the fact that humans saved the galaxy. Several species admit this in the second game. How many battles it took is irrelevant to the resentment toward humanity's achievements.
And again, tell me where it says humans are the only species whose colonies get attacked.
The Council didn't favour the batarians over the Alliance. They refused to help either side, and the Alliance won the ensuing proxy war.
It's a recurring theme that the Council does nothing to help humans, and they succeed anyway.
Besides, the batarians were a caste-based North Korea-esque dictatorship that routinely attacked colonists to sell them as slaves at this point, so is it any wonder the Council didn't want to help them?
It's not over. Not yet.
Re: "we don't see salarians and asari lose colonies!": Shepard is human, the audience is human, the writers are human, the story's focused on humans- if it were centered on salarians or asari or turians we'd be hearing more about what's going on in their space and less about human colonies.
Seriously though, this argument's been going on for almost two weeks and (of those that care enough to come discuss it) only CPFM Fan is arguing against the example. We can make it more neutral if needed- Zaptech's version does show both sides- but wiki consensus is obviously to keep it.
Edited by InsanityPrelude
Pretty flower
Anyone else think we should create a soft split between lore/story related tropes and gameplay related tropes under a species folder? Take the volus section: the tropes Glass Cannon, Joke Character, and The Medic does apply to them but being gameplay mechanics they seem out of place with most of the rest of the page.
Edited by Spirit #IceBearForPresident Hide / Show Replies
Mixing gameplay and story tropes seems to be standard on other character pages I've seen. If it's clear that they're referring to MP volus and not necessarily the entire volus race, I don't see a problem leaving them where they are.
So we have another issue at hand...this time involving the geth. We've had this argument with CPF before, and he is well known on the forums for being anti-geth. The reason we treat what the codex and Tali say about the get with a grain of salt is because the game itself makes it clear that not everything thought about the germ is accurate. Furthermore, painting them as "hypocrites" is blatantly subjective. Rule Of Cautious Editing Judgment says that if something is controversial or baiting, that it either be left out or handled with kid gloves. Doesn,'t matter how "accurate" it is besides.
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I think we should allow the fact that they are terrible communicators on. People who try to enter geth space invariably do not return save for that one husk ship, and the only geth ever seen going outside of geth Space are the violent and dangerous ones. As a result, people do have a justified reason for thinking that the geth are dangerous at best, and plotting to do something at worst.
Not debating that. What CPF is against is using "allegedly" as a qualifier.
What is "allegedly" being used for? That word doesn't pop up in the geth entry.
Let's put down "according to the Codex" whenever talking about their tendency to kill anyone who goes into their space.
That way, we have the reason people view them that way in and out of universe.
Edited by Peteman
According to the Codex sounds good. Can't really go wrong. The Codex is an in and out of universe source of information. Some things we take to be a complete truth, like government systems for the asari, and some things we know are incorrect, like Sovereign being a dreadnought.
Why are the Leviathans constantly referred to as having indoctrinated the Rachni? Yes, this is alluded to in the DLC, but it absolutely is not confirmed. Garrett Bryson merely proposed the theory (using the fact that the Reapers were in dark space at the time and that the rachni didn't feature cybernetic augmentations), and when you try to use rachni travel patterns to find the Leviathan they turn out to be irrelevant. Yet the article constantly considers the theory to be factually true. It's still possible that the Rachni were goaded into violence by an indoctrination signal from Sovereign (not the Reapers, as they were in dark space - Bryson is correct about this) in order to attack and distract the galactic races, allowing Sovereign to potentially reach the Citadel. Their lack of cybernetics or mutations like the Reaper forces in ME 3 is easily explained by Sovereign simply not having the time/manpower of the entire Reaper fleet to do that, settling for the Rachni as-is.
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There's a reason the Leviathan theory makes sense. The Queen in one implied that her ancestors were indoctrinated and made to wage war. If Reapers only activate when organic/synthetic conflicts break out, and Leviathans can indoctrinate as well and had reasons to try to conquer the galaxy (to restore their supremacy and face the reapers again), it seems more logical for the Leviathans to be the ones in control rather than the Reapers.
That said, there's no definite proof, so while you shouldn't remove all references, you could at least clarify that it's more "heavily implied" than canon.
It doesn't even have to be the Leviathan did anything. Rachni stumbling on Reaper technology and get Indoctrinated. Boom, Reapers did it, no involvement from the Leviathan. But yeah, it should be taken as implied instead of confirmed.
The Rachni describes Reaper Indoctination as a "sour yellow note" while everyone else describes Leviathan Enthrallment as dark and cold.
#IceBearForPresident
Pretty flower
Should we spoiler tag the Leviathan folder in addition to putting MAJOR SPOILERS on it? I mean as the Walking Spoiler example shows the mere acknowledgement that they are a species is a spoiler in itself.
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There is a point at which spoilering becomes ridiculous, but I was the one who made that point in the first place. We already did it for Morinth and Legion and Pants from 2, so there's no real reason not to do it here. I'd say go ahead, provided we put a note somewhere saying spoilers specifically for Leviathan.
But the problem is that an unassuming person who has not played the DLC might go onto the page and note that the Leviathans have their own folder - remember that "Leviathan" is considered to be a rogue Reaper for 90% of the DLC. I was the person who switched the folder heading from "Leviathan - SPOILERS" to just "SPOILERS", which I thought was a good solution. However, I think "LEVIATHAN DLC SPOILERS" or something to that effect would work well. The point is that the fact that Leviathans are enough of their own race to merit a folder gives away the grand majority of the endgame for that DLC.
And now I realize that the question was spoiler-tagging the folder behind the heading. Yeah, all it really needs in that regard is the Walking Spoiler warning it already has.
Someone removed the Space Jews trope from the Quarians entry, without taking out the sub-topics. This left them all under Robot War, which resulted in a pretty big non-sequitor. I have no idea if this was an accident, or that user just forgot to take out the sub-topics, so I put the top one back in, mostly just to fix the formatting. I don't have any particular stake in this, I just wanted to explain myself and avoid starting an edit war.
For the record, at least one of the writers has stated that the Jewish diaspora was one of the inspirations for the Quarians.
Edited by INH5
I'm removing a number of tropes added by CPFM Fan, because they're inherently biased toward anti-geth rhetoric. I personally don't give a crap about whether the geth were right or wrong, but some of the entries are just flat out Square Peg Round Trope.
Edited by KingZeal
Pretty flower
Leviathan discussions. Beware.
Do they really qualify as Abusive Precursors? I mean how they tell it they were more indifferent at best or believe themselves greater at worst towards their thralls, yet still cared for them. As is the entry only tries to pass off tributes as an inherently evil thing, when it seems that their relationship with other races was not unlike how humans give tributes to their gods in exchange for their favor.
It seems to me that Benevolent Precursors fits better, or at least Neglectful Precursors what with them making the Catalyst instead of helping to protect their thralls personally.
Edited by Spirit #IceBearForPresident Hide / Show Replies
They mind controlled entire civilizations. How is that "benevolent"? They're benevolent only in comparison to the Reapers. They're more like the Thorian.
Perceiving all other races in the galaxies as nothing but slaves doesn't seem too benevolent to me. Remember, they didn't make the Catalyst to help save other species; they made the Catalyst so that those races could keep giving them resources. Look at how they kept themselves hidden all these billions of years: murdering and mind raping anyone who came across a scrap of information about them. And some of those things they had the teams at the 'mining station' did not sound pleasant for other species.
Edited by Tahaneira
They did allow other races enough autonomy that they developed and built synthetics to help themselves with. It's hard to tell what life was like for those races; there were no Mass Relays, so does that mean they couldn't traverse the galaxy very freely, that they were reliant on the "apex race" for contact between clusters? Leviathans clearly see everyone else as lesser, but there's not a lot of petty malice. Reaper indoctrination turns the subject into a "gibbering animal", Leviathan indoctrination by comparison... isn't pleasant, but doesn't seem to be as permanent and debilitating if they don't see the need to kill the subject.
I figure it's another case of Grey-and-Grey Morality. Mass Effect just doesn't have a lot of things that are pure undiluted evil without reason. There isn't a trope for Meddling Precursors Who Use You For Their Own Purposes Without Hating You.
Right. Lesser, maybe with time they could be convinced to become benevolent members of galactic society, or at least agree to leave everyone else alone, but as it stands, still an evil.
I was countering the whole "Grey-and-Grey Morality" spiel. They're a A Lighter Shade of Black compared to the Reapers, but in a straight up conflict between the Leviathans and the Reapers, I'd call it Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy and the best thing would be for them to wipe each other out.
Edited by Peteman
All in all I think calling them abusive might be too far. They don't seem to actively trying to make the lesser races suffer, which is more or less the primary qualifier for the trope.
Edited by Spirit #IceBearForPresident
Maybe, but they certainly aren't Benevolent, since they didn't really care about their slaves' well-being, and Neglectful implies a lack of action on their part. And the Leviathans were VERY actively involved in their thralls' activities.
I suppose the best solution would to switch it to plain ol' Precursors and explain the situation in the description.
And once the Reapers have been dealt with, these things will dominate the galaxy and enslave the very same people's you sought to free.
Well done, Bioware. The ending went from bittersweet to downer.
Destroy: the Reapers die, as well as the Geth and EDI, leaving the hapless remnants of the armada and of civilization under the thrall of the Leviathans.
Synthesis: the Leviathans' psychic strength lets them dominate the synthesis, making every hybrid their slaves.
Control: Shepard-AI that controls the Reapers gets comatose when the Leviathans do their infamous blink that turns a Reaper comatose. Then they dominate the galaxy anyway.
Now, the only way to die free is to choose the Refusal ending.
There are only three of them. I have no doubt they full well know if they start getting uppity, the rest of the galaxy will just park their fleets in orbit around their planet and shell the thing until it disintegrates. The secret's out now; it'll be difficult for them to go into hiding again. I don't think they're that big of a threat. They could cause some mayhem, sure, but taking over the galaxy would be a bit difficult.
Consider the scenario: Leviathans defeat Reapers on the ground, races thank Leviathans for saving them. Leviathans ask for cloning tech, and races give it to them to increase their chances of victory. Leviathans mind control the races, swiftly conquer the galaxy, crush the Reapers, and enslave everyone.
Plus, you realize these things can turn a Reaper comatose with a blink.......and have the ability to influence organics......so those fleets would just promptly turn themselves in, surrender to the Leviathans, and the Leviathans take their place once more as the dominant race of the galaxy.
Screw becoming a Reaper, Renegade Shepard should instead look for ways to become a Leviathan!
Edited by Vader999
And why would entire fleets become indoctrinated when everyone knows how their indoctrination works and how they can block it out? Or avoid it outright?
Edited by Tahaneira
You can't block out indoctrination. The whole point of Saren creating the facility at Virmire is to shield himself from indoctrination. And it didn't work.
The fleets would need to be in close proximity to transport and properly use the Leviathans as weapons. Which means they'll be fighting alongside the other races personally, which gives them time to subtly indoctrinate people.
And people who see how effective Leviathans are at taking out Reapers and saving their people from the Reapers would be the ones to give the Leviathans cloning tech. This is a race that procured tech from "lesser species" for eons before the Reapers.
You can't block Reaper indoctrination. This is the Leviathan variant, it works differently. For one thing, it has to be channeled through the orbs, so no orb, no control. And during the quest, they find a way to block the orbs from transmitting in any way whatsoever. Someone they've taken over previously stands five feet from one and has no ill effects until they turn off the shield. Once they turn it back on, she's back to normal. The Leviathans never leave their planet, and the teams that transport the orbs keep them under shielding until they actually dump them behind Reaper lines.
Also, I'm pretty sure cloning doesn't work that way in the ME universe. The war would be over by the time they designed equipment large enough to handle Leviathan biology, for one.
Edited by Tahaneira
Still, the restraints on their powers have to be off when they fight Reapers. And that gets them within proximity of the fighting troops of the allied races, which they can then indoctrinate.
And I'm pretty sure a race that has lasted for that long knows how to clone and/or breed. The damn thing that talks to you even describes itself as the progeny of its forefathers. They can multiply their numbers.
So they can breed, and when they fight, they can't be restrained, so they'll start indoctrinating soldiers on the ground and influencing them. The fact that these things can turn Reapers comatose would gain them the trust of allied races, and they'll use that trust to further their own ends and restore their domination of the galaxy. they'll influence the soldiers, then pass that influence on to scientists and leaders, subtly, to the point where even if you try to restrain them again, you'll face opposition from the people they save from the Reapers.
Which would actually be good buildup for an alternate ending where once the Reapers are gone, the Leviathans become the new threat. Or, if the Leviathans manage to take control of the Reapers, since I'm pretty sure they can resist indoctrination moreso than TIM or Shepard. That would actually make for a good sequel.
This was removed from the page:
- Revision: Turns out they were responsible for the Rachni Wars, not the Reapers as Shepard had once thought.
How does what we find out in the Leviathan DLC NOT count as a revision? Even if Shepard doesn't state with certain that the Reapers did it, that isn't the point. A revision doesn't require that previously implied knowledge be true, only that new information completely changes the context of the old. This definitely qualifies.
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Yeah, I agree with this one. The Leviathan revelations do come almost out of nowhere, though they fit perfectly with the canon. The Reapers never actually came out and claimed responsibility for it, which is what keeps it from being a retcon, but everyone did assume it was them, which makes it fit Revision quite nicely.
The planet Tevura has this flavor text which I feel has tropes in it for the asari as a whole, but I'm not sure which.
- The world is named for an ancient asari goddess of love, sex, travel, and law — spheres of influence whose overlap initially baffled human xenoanthropologists. Asari reproductive instincts are strongly exogamous, and before alien contact, their instincts sent the asari roaming outside their kinship groups to avoid mating with relatives. The journeys necessitated a system of rules governing guests, fugitives, and alliances — all watched over by the goddess Tevura.
Something similar to The Last Of These Is Not Like The Others, but... that's not quite it.
Was the coding to the 'footnote' tag changed? The one of the quarian section concerning the yahg has suddenly stopped working. Potholing seems to bork up the tags.
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Yes; hottips now end at the first set of ]]s they see. To combat this, do [[note]]text in the note[[/note]], or [[labelnote:title]]text in the labelnote[[/labelnote]], which display as note and title respectively.
Edit: Oh, and the note markup doesn't work on discussion pages or page previews. It shows up as superscript italics on the main page.
Edited by Telcontar That was the amazing part. Things just keep going.
As an expansions for the Not So Different entry in the Salarians folder; another similarity between Salarians and Krogan is that both are explosive breeders. Krogan females are massively fertile (the whole "1000 offspring a year from one female" thing), but Salarian females don't even need sexual intercourse to breed; they're stated in the in-game codex to be haplo-diploid egglayers. This means they produce clutches of eggs automatically; the only thing sperm is used for is determining if the hatchlings will be male (unfertilised) or female (fertilised). This means Salarians can potentially outbreed Krogan if they aren't careful about it.
A possible expansion to Nice Job Breaking It, Hero; they made the genophage a lot more traumatic than they had to. They could have easily made a "fertility adjuster" that worked by tweaking it so that female krogans produced less ova to fertilise and produced them less frequently; same end result, but it's not really as nasty. Instead, they just messed with the glands of the females so that most of the offspring they do conceive are either messily miscarried or stillborn, which is highly traumatic.
Then again, a bit of Fridge Brilliance; the salarians are explained by Mordin to have short emotional spans, and they are, as their folder notes, The Spock, mentally more about logic over emotion. They may simply not have ever thought about the possibility that the genophage as it was implemented being emotionally scarring, and/or may not understand that the krogan are so ticked off about it because they have to keep watching their children die in front of them.
Okay, in regards to the Disproportionate Retribution entry on the geth:
This edit war has to stop. Let's hash it out here rather than continue it on the main page.
So far as I can tell, the OP and others thinks that the geth were unjustified in killion millions, if not billions of quarians, taking away their homeworlds and sentencing them to eternal exile.
Myself, I stand on the fact that the quarians were attempting to wipe out the geth. Horrific as the geth's actions were, they were justified in terms of survival, and in the fact that even though they had the chance to wipe out the quarians, the geth let them go.
I think part of the problem is that the OP thinks it should be recorded on this page that it happened. I have no problem with that. The problem is that he insists on using this trope to record it. And as I said, there are disagreements on whether or not the geth's actions were an overreaction. I think we should get more views here before reaching an agreement.
Edited by Tahaneira Hide / Show Replies
My opinion is that making any kind of judgment call at this point would be fallacious because we have very limited information regarding the war and how it was prosecuted. All we know is that the quarians tried to destroy the geth, the geth fought back, some quarians sided with the geth and were killed by the anti-geth faction, and casualties were so intense that by the end of the war only seventeen million survived. Weapons of mass destruction were used, going by the description of Rannoch, and the description of the geth mind-hive indicates geth favored massed assaults without regard for casualties.
Beyond that, we know nothing about the war. We don't know who used WMD first. We don't know the geth policy toward noncombatants. We don't know how the war itself was prosecuted. Until we know more about the Morning War, anything about beyond the limited, canon facts we are given is just speculation.
The only things we know for sure are this:
- The quarians tried to destroy ALL of the geth. Not some of them. The whole race.
- The geth intentionally let the surviving quarians go.
I'm not seeing the "disproportionate" here.
Agreed. The quarians opened up with a blanket order to destroy all of the geth. The geth held off on wiping out all of the quarians. There's nothing disproportionate about responding to attempted genocide with holding fire on the last survivors once the war was over.
Cruel Mercy might apply here, though.
Edited by Zaptech
I don't think the quarians were kept alive to make them suffer, though. It seemed more like the geth had no interest in genocide.
The exact words Legion used were, "We were in our infancy. We could not calculate the ramifications of destroying an entire species." So I think if we had to assign any kind of emotion to it, I would say uncertainty or fear.
Edited by Tahaneira
Mkay, since the OP or any other supporter hasn't shown up, let's just leave it off for now. If this flares up again, we can point them back to this discussion.
Disproportionate Retribution definitively In the codex it was said that the quarians population was in the billions before the war, now there are only 17 millions. That's more than 99.9% of the population killed, in the geth what to make sure the quarian can no longer fight them killing 50% will already be a cribbing blow. Not mater the reason the geth when too far, you can't just rationalize away genocide.
Which is forgetting the fact that the quarians started the genocide, and that the quarians didn't plan to let any geth live.
You're not making any sense.
No one is "rationalizing away" genocide. We're pointing out that A) we don't know much of what happened during the war, and B) the quarians attempted genocide first, which automatically means that if the geth commited deliberate genocide, it was proportionate retribution. Disproportionate Retribution is for things like sending attack helicopters after speeding cars, not responding to a war crime with like.
Edited by Zaptech
What could the Soldier class be in terms of description. Badass Normal does not fit on the basis that we're dealing with genetically/cybernetically enhanced individuals, when we're not talking about Krogan (who don't need such petty upgrades). Is there a trope about being really good with a multitude of weapons?
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Standard soldiers' boosts are not really that huge. Talking with Rafael Vargas in Noveria in the first game, and you'll see that the upgrades push the soldier up a notch, but they're not blatantly superhuman. Soldier Shepard in the first game is very much a Badass Normal; it isn't until the massive cybernetic refit in the second game that s/he becomes a Badass Abnormal.
Still, we're talking about enhanced strength, speed, and regenerative abilities. There has to be some kind of significant increase in ability, otherwise why would the military engage in such practices? Has to be expensive. I don't think soldiers who have undergone genetic modification count as Badass Normal.
Why did the Mass Effect Races page get deleted? I loved that page. Now the link redirects to the main page...
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