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Post by Rascarin on Feb 3, 2014 21:57:34 GMT 1
Just finished my Bad Decisions Shepard playthrough - essentially making all the worst decisions and getting the lowest War Assets I could managed.
Notable choices include - saving the council so the human fleet suffered - killing wrex - killing the rachni queen - letting Kirrahe die - selling legion to Cerberus - killing off everyone else in me2 (kept zaeed and samara, then ignored their missions in 3) - sabotaging the cure ( and shooting Wiks) - letting the tuchanka bomb explode - buggering the quarians fleets, then siding with them - letting the salarian councilor die - ignoring all non-priority quests
Went to earth with only 1127 war assets. And... Wow. Gave the ending a completely different feel, much more desperate and tragic. Actually easier to swallow Shepards death when the situation was that much more desperate. A lot more emotional throughout, I thought.
Anyone else done this?
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Post by Mister Buch on Feb 3, 2014 22:10:33 GMT 1
I did once play ME3 with a completely new Shepard, and the decision Bioware had chosen led to a lot of party-member deaths, a shaky future for the krogan and a Quarian victory on Rannoch. And I agree - the ending was rather depressing, in a kind-of good way.
Those are some crazy bad decisions though! Good idea.
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Post by jklinders on Feb 3, 2014 22:20:03 GMT 1
Must have been a quick playthrough!
Also probably closer to what Shepard would have had time to do. One of the good things about the game is that they give you all the time you need to do the sidequests. It's also one of the odder things.
This makes me think of something I was hoping to see before I played the game. I was hoping for more of a slower grind of the Reapers coming in from the fringes and clawing their way through the systems heading toward the Citadel to shut the relays down. Every mission you do giving you more assets to fight them with but seeing them get closer to their goal. A time limit that forces you to choose who to help and how. tradeoffs.
Sadly I never really felt that urgency because I knew the Reapers would advance at the speed of plot rather than by any actual time passing from Shepard's actions. It could have been far worse, but imagine if we were forced to choose due to limited time.
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Post by Clint Johnston on Feb 3, 2014 22:37:24 GMT 1
I would have hated that, Linders. I'm a completionist, and that one mission I had to miss would bug the snot out of me.
Considered doing a bad decisions guy, but again, I'm a completionist, I'd have to start from the beginning. What changed at the end?
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Post by Warhammer Gorvar on Feb 3, 2014 22:55:31 GMT 1
Did someone see....Completionist?
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Post by Rascarin on Feb 3, 2014 22:55:37 GMT 1
The ending was very different. A lot more ships get destroyed in the space battle, you see the Turian flank fail. Only 25% of hammer makes it to the FOB. Your squad mates get vaporised during the run to the beam (quite sad). While the catalyst is being brought in, it is under attack and gets damaged. You see Hacketts ship taking heavy fire.
As for the choices, you only get one. I destroyed the Collector base, which meant I could only Destroy. Becaus,e the catalyst is damaged and incomplete, the blast is a lot worse. The child tells you that pretty much anything synthetic will be obliterated, and billions will die as a result. When the blast hits, Earth is destroyed. You see the Normandy crashed on the jungle planet, but don't find out if anyone survived. The epilogue is very short. - Hackett saying how much was lost in the name of victory, and how he can only hope that future generations will not make the mistakes of the past. No scene on the Normandy with the death wall, no happy victory scenes on other planets.
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Post by Clint Johnston on Feb 3, 2014 23:10:36 GMT 1
Ouch! Rough end!
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Post by jklinders on Feb 3, 2014 23:23:54 GMT 1
I would have hated that, Linders. I'm a completionist, and that one mission I had to miss would bug the snot out of me. Considered doing a bad decisions guy, but again, I'm a completionist, I'd have to start from the beginning. What changed at the end? But it would give you more replay value as you could see what would be different with different actions. Completionism cold be handled over multiple playthroughs as well. It just seems strange that a game that prided itself on the concept of meaningful choices lets you do everything with next to no meaningful change in outcome, unless you do what Rascarin did and did a suicidally deliberately bad outcome run.
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Post by Rascarin on Feb 4, 2014 1:23:34 GMT 1
I'm really glad I did this playthrough. I'm normally a completionist myself, and it was surprisingly difficult to stick to my guns and make all the wrong decisions. I really liked watching how it turned out, though. One of my favourite changes was having Padok Wiks working on the genophage - he was a really cool character. I've never seen a renegade Mordin death, but Padoks was heartbreaking. Watching him whimper and die after I shot him was really sad.
Shooting the Virmire survivor was a bit of a let down, Kaidan just kind of.... Didn't do anything. Then died.
I also liked seeing the different reactions of NPCs - talking to Hackett about your state of readiness, making Traynor sad if you ignore her warnings.
The only thing I wish is that I'd been more invested in my character - my feelings at the end caught me by surprise, I wish I'd role-played it better. Definitely recommend a bad decisions playthrough though. I
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Post by Mister Buch on Feb 4, 2014 1:26:27 GMT 1
Kaidan just kind of.... Didn't do anything. Then died. Kaidan is like that! That's probably what they'll say at his eulogy.
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Post by Rascarin on Feb 4, 2014 1:29:22 GMT 1
Ooh, one thing I did do that I never did before is turn Kaidan into a racist renegade in ME1. That was an interesting twist as well. Not a fan of the racism, but it was interesting to see him try to grow a personality.
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Post by Cali on Feb 4, 2014 1:33:14 GMT 1
Rascarin is starting to anger me.
EDIT: Oh, wait. Just another L2 flare-up.
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Post by Rascarin on Feb 4, 2014 12:04:31 GMT 1
I think for my next playthrough I'm going to enact a strict "No Charm/Intimidate" rule. Most of the games "best" choices require a charm/intimidate check, and I think it will be interesting to force some of the hard choices. Like the Quarian/Geth decision, as one example. And smaller choices, like the loyalty conflicts in ME2.
I liked that Shepard got to fix everything in 3, but think more of the hard decisions would have given it more of an edge. (And not the dumb decisions like "Save everyone" or "Slaughter everyone for funnies")
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Post by Mister Buch on Feb 4, 2014 12:23:02 GMT 1
Interesting idea. I always feel like I'm missing out on several dialogue options for serious decisions, since I obviously pick charm or intimidate and leave the other three alone. There's probably a wealth of dialogue we've never heard.
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Post by Rascarin on Feb 4, 2014 12:42:06 GMT 1
That's what I figured. I always feel obligated to pick those options so the game doesn't punish you, but definitely feel like I've missed out on a lot. Like Tali's loyalty mission in 2, I've never not resolved that peacefully, and am interested to see what the exile is like.
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