After the ending: Galactic civilization [spoilers]

[the_mango55]

How would you go about returning civilization to the galaxy?

Lets assume you chose the "destroy" option, since if you chose control or synthesis you could just have the Reapers make some new relays. Also let's assume this is the real ending and the indoctrination theories are all just hot air.


There are some things that must be agreed upon prior to beginning this process. First, the Sol system is the new galactic capitol, it has to be since this is where things are starting up. Second, no more secret technologies, if galactic civilization is to be reestablished then there must be total cooperation between the species with everyone having access to everything the others have.

First thing we must accomplish is to gather and study all of the reaper technology we can. Indoctrination is no longer an issue so we shouldn't have to be too concerned about it. Reapers have FTL technology that in addition to being faster, does not require discharges or refueling. This tech is vital for galactic travel with no relays. We also need to devote lots of resources to creating as many quantum entangled pairs as possible. These would be installed on all capital ships leaving Sol, they would also carry with them as many extras as we can spare to give to colonies we establish and rediscover. Sol would act as a galactic switchboard, if a Salarian colony needed to contact an Asari colony in another part of the galaxy, it would use its communicator to contact earth then data would be locally transmitted to the communicator paired with the Asari colony.

Huge capital ships would need to be constructed to provide both transportation and long term habitation for refugees returning to their homeworlds and colonists trying to contact old colonies and establish new ones. They wouldn't need to be exceptionally powerful in battle so they wouldn't likely be as expensive as dreadnaughts, but they would still have to be able to fend off pirates or hostile colonies.

For races whose homeworld is far away, for example the Quarians, the majority of their race would be put in cry sleeper pods on the decades long voyage to Rannoch, while the few noble volunteers pilot the ships, knowing they likely won't see their home until they are old. Alternatively they could crew the fleet in shifts of 1-2 years. This would be necessary not just so that more QUarians could make it back home in good health, but so that they will have enough resources to survive the voyage.

While these ships are traveling, scientists need to be studying mass relay tech. Hopefully the Conduit, which was not connected to the Relay network, was not destroyed. Once a viable blueprint is discovered, it can be transmitted to everyone with a communicator, and eventually a new relay network can be established.

[The Dude]

They could teleport around the universe with space magic, since I suppose that exists now.

And maybe use synthetic DNA.

Sorry can't help myself. It just feels pointless speculating about a setting which the authors have ruined and obviously do not care about.

[the_mango55]

The Millenium Falcon teleported itself from the Hoth system to Bespin with no hyperdrive via space magic in TESB, i didn't let it ruin the movie for me.

[The Dude]

Hah, good point. A small amount of space magic in comparison to the massive multicoloured ball of doom that came out of nowhere in ME3 though. It just turned the entire universe on its head. They didn't even bother to ground the Crucible in existing lore, or make it a vastly more simple concept than it was. Who not make it a reaper shield jammer that uses the Citadel as a signal amplifier? And then suddenly the tide turns just like in ROTJ when Han destroys the shield generator. Its more generic, but would it work? Hell yes it would work.

The fact that something so simple yet effective was never even considered made me feel like I was playing a first draft plot. If the writers can't be arsed to put the effort in, then neither can I. Sorry mate.

And then there's the fact that Spacekid invalidates the entire plot of ME1, the fact that his reasoning is circular, the fact that the final showdown on the citadel with TIM and Anderson made no chronological sense, etc. The list of sloppy offenses just goes on and on.

[the_mango55]

Yes that would be the predictable way to end it. In fact that's what I expected from the moment I heard of the Crucible.

I'm not going to hold it against them for wanting to do something different though.

The Catalyst's reasoning can easily be explained. He wants to keep synthetics from destroying ALL organics, so every cycle he destroys only the advanced organics (and any synthetics already created) to keep them from destroying themselves. He has so far succeeded in preserving organic life, whereas if it were not for the reapers it's possible that all organic life would be gone by now. What we don't know is why he's interested in preserving organics if he's not going to let them advance.

I don't know about the chronological issues though.

[General Brittanicus]

The first thing i would do would be to order all Turians and Quarians to sacrifice themselves to feed everybody else (I dont know if they are edible to the other races, but we need some kind of food source). Then I would probably have to do something about the Krogan since i don't think the other remaining races would be able to stop them taking over when things got more desperate in the future.

After those things have been carried out I guess I'd probably start harvesting Reaper tech and whatnot and hope that we don't run out of food before we can incorporate it into our own ships. Also we will have to court martial Joker for cowardice if we could ever find that planet he fled to at the end.

All that stuff would only be for the people at earth though - I dont how the rest of the galaxy is going to fend off starvation, the annihilation of the galactic economy, all their smartest people being stuck at Earth and the fact that all of their planets and the rest of galactic infrastructure are in ruins.

Having said all that though I would just agree with The Dude and use the much easier option of using space magic to fix it all.

[molonthegreat]

The galaxy and especially earth is ed, since it would be incredibly naive to expect all races to holding hands singing we shall overcame when they have all been stranded on earth with its limited resources and everything else is years away. So my take is that all species stranded in the solar system will have a massive war among them for the scorched earth, however the Dude's space magic thing could work.

[Eikki]

Dont forget that unless there is an infinite amount of dextro food on earth the turians and quarians are going to have to eat each other, cannibalise or starve to death. Goody.

[General Brittanicus]

Dont forget that unless there is an infinite amount of dextro food on earth the turians and quarians are going to have to eat each other, cannibalise or starve to death. Goody.

Thats why is suggested we eat them. However its also the reason why i didn't know if they would even be edible to us.

[Eikki]

We cant. Their bodies are entirely based on dextro-amino acids. Any other race would die if they ate them. Best to let them commit suicide or put a bullet in their heads to save them a slow death.

[Tankfriend]

Mordin makes it pretty clear in his relationship advice in ME2, that... "ingestion"... will trigger a highly allergic reaction and anaphylactic shock, if the persons in question happen to be of different types of amino acids.

As to the question at hand, I can't see how you could really come out of the situation without massive problems.

- You have a huge armada gathered in the Sol system.
- Earth as the only garden world in the entire system is completely devastated, hence incapable of supplying even a fracture of that armada.
- Even if it were, the two single largest parts of the armada (Turians and Quarians) are incompatible with Earth-produced food supplies.
- Also, the armada is filled with potential for conflicts to break out given the duress of the situation. The treaties Shepard managed to broker under great difficulties might not hold and end up in triggering a new war throughout the armada.
- The relay network is destroyed, so you no longer have easy access to the rest of the galaxy. Shipping in necessary supplies in any feasible time is basically impossible. Interstellar communication has also become very difficult to manage, as systems replacing direct contact (like Quantum Entanglement Communicators) are expensive and rare.
- FTL drive is still available, but the H3 fuel supply system has been completely devastated across the galaxy, so FTL is a problematic option, at best, as it takes years or decades to get to a point at any meaningful distance.
- The Citadel has been destroyed, which means you have lost the single largest data collection about the galaxy (supposing that on-board data storage on ships is severely limited), which makes basically everything more difficult (research, diplomacy, navigation...).

Speaking of Starkid, by the way...

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Even if you accept that Starkids intention of preventing a total annihilation of organic life by committing to a periodical "cleansweep" has its own kind of "logic", it doesn't make all that much sense in the long run.
1) What is it basing its theory on? It cannot have proof for it, because that would mean that organic life has already been completely wiped out once - and that can't have happened. Starkid is therefore committing to the extinction cycle out of a baseless assumption.

2) Why isn't Starkid using the Reapers to wipe out Synthetics that threaten Organics - the most direct and most logical solution to the problem? That way, Starkid could even refrain from having to remove the individuality and dynamic development of Organics, which it claims is the important part of organic life.

3) What is Starkid itself? Is it a collective consciousness like a Reaper? Is it an AI? We don't know. But if it is the latter, it is directly contradicting its own theory, because it then is a Synthetic itself that is trying to preserve organic life, rather than wiping it out completely.

There are other points like the Geth-Quarian war which we can completely turn around, or EDI expressly orienting herself on Organics and vying to protect them at the cost of her own life. We also have the case of the Protheans, who successfully fought an Organic-Synthetic hybrid species (the AIs took over...) before the Reapers turned up, but let's assume that all these might have eventually ended up as the Catalyst claims.

[General Brittanicus]

We cant. Their bodies are entirely based on dextro-amino acids. Any other race would die if they ate them. Best to let them commit suicide or put a bullet in their heads to save them a slow death.

Dammit. Well I guess we just kill them all off then to save them from a long drawn out death from starvation. What about the Krogan? Can we eat them?

[Eikki]

Yeah we can, but if Wrex has his way the Krogans are the ones who are going to eat the other weaker races. Dont forget his eat everything that is annoying motto from ME1.

[NotYetRegistered]

The galaxy and especially earth is ed, since it would be incredibly naive to expect all races to holding hands singing we shall overcame when they have all been stranded on earth with its limited resources and everything else is years away. So my take is that all species stranded in the solar system will have a massive war among them for the scorched earth, however the Dude's space magic thing could work.

Could controlling the Reapers solve this problem? Use them to send each and every race back to their homeplanets? Or is that just too far?

[Eikki]

If Shepard has full control I guess he could order the reapers to rebuild the relays, thus allowing the races to eventually get back home. If the ending made that clear at the conclusion I think a lot of us would have been happy even though Shepard is dead. But even that is left to the speculation of the bewildered players.

[General Brittanicus]

Yeah we can, but if Wrex has his way the Krogans are the ones who are going to eat the other weaker races. Dont forget his eat everything that is annoying motto from ME1.

If we can launch some kind of surprise attack and take down all the Krogan at once before they know whats happening we might be able to do it. But then again all those Krogan are going to start decomposing pretty quickly and they'd be filled with holes and whatnot after we killed them, so as a food source they may not last very long. So after we (humanity) run out of Krogan to eat (assuming we manage to beat them in a fight) I guess we either kill and eat all the Asari who I assume are also the only race capable of constructing new relays or we just join the Turians and Quarians and all commit some mass murder-suicide pact to save ourselves the trouble of starving to death.

[Eikki]

Can we eat dead reapers too?
I want to feast on Harbinger.

[molonthegreat]

Could controlling the Reapers solve this problem? Use them to send each and every race back to their homeplanets? Or is that just too far?

Maybe, but honestly I can't see any way that all species would work together when stranded in the sol system since they don't have any common enemy anymore, I mean just think about it hundreds of thousands of soldiers, hundreds of ships, a dozen different species and a chronic lack of resources because Earth is almost completely destroyed. I can imagine that one hour after the ending all species start to squabble and old conflicts will blossom up, even if Shepardstill is alive.

[Eikki]

Another thing that I just thought about. If you choose the destroy ending that means there are hundreds of dead reapers on earth and other planets. Remember how dead reapers can turn people into husks(derelict reaper in ME2)? So does everyone on Earth slowly get indoctrinated or did the space magic 'unreaperify' them?

[Tankfriend]

I guess it's the latter. Destroying the Reapers but them still being a danger would be stupid and besides the point of even the ending we have.