234: What If... the krogan NEVER fought off the rachni?

[SPEAKER_03]: I'm Commander Sheppard, and this is my favorite lore cast on the Citadel. [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to the Mass Effect lorecast. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm in seven the legend. [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm Genesis. [SPEAKER_02]: Join us. [SPEAKER_01]: As we explore along tides of light. [SPEAKER_01]: And through sholes of dust.

[SPEAKER_01]: To see where this lore began. [SPEAKER_02]: And consider where it may go. [SPEAKER_01]: Spectres, welcome back to another inquisitive episode of the Mass Effect Lord cast and hopefully this one peeks your interest. [SPEAKER_01]: Joining me as always is my wonderful co-host, Genesis. [SPEAKER_01]: Genesis, it has been a rough day to start for me, however, just being here with you and talking about Mass Effect has honestly very much uplifted my mood.

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, it feels good to be here, you know, Tuesday night used to be kind of boring and lame and now I get to chat with you every week and that makes me happy. [SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely. [SPEAKER_01]: All right. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, we have some perhaps not happy implications from the topic that we're discussing today.

[SPEAKER_01]: You know, it's been a little bit since we had a what if episode, but we're doing another what if episode tonight, and we're discussing what if, [SPEAKER_01]: the Crogan never saved the galaxy from the Ragnai wars or from the Ragnai in the wars. [SPEAKER_01]: So basically what if they were never the X-factor?

[SPEAKER_01]: What would have happened? [SPEAKER_02]: And we've also just caught on to your eye uplift video spirit. [SPEAKER_01]: I was waiting. [SPEAKER_02]: I took me a second. [SPEAKER_02]: Good job. [SPEAKER_01]: Hey, yo, I'm here all week. [SPEAKER_01]: All year actually. [SPEAKER_01]: So I have a few discussion questions and you've written down some notes of your own about, you know, kind of gaming out this scenario where the Crogan were never that tied turning force.

[SPEAKER_01]: in the war. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think it's probably easiest to understand if we separate these by like different kind of sectors of results and consequences and implications. [SPEAKER_01]: And so first of all, I want to talk about obviously the military consequences. [SPEAKER_01]: So first, let's just dive right into it.

[SPEAKER_01]: do you think that the Citadel species and the non- Citadel species that had a sizable military could have eventually defeated the Ragnai without the Crogon intervention? [SPEAKER_01]: Or do you think that the Galactic Order would have just completely collapsed? [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, so that's an interesting one because it really could go either way.

[SPEAKER_02]: We know that the Koreans had, you know, some form of military superiority. [SPEAKER_02]: The Asari have their biotic abilities. [SPEAKER_02]: The Celarians are heavily involved in tech and subterviewed. [SPEAKER_02]: They, you know, the Koreans, I don't know, this was, this was pre-geth, right?

[SPEAKER_01]: That's a great question, yes, this was pre-geth, and it's really interesting that you bring that up, because the Geth may have also, if they had been around sooner, the Geth may have also been that kind of like savior. [SPEAKER_02]: the death could have played a key factor into it. [SPEAKER_02]: And who knows, maybe AI could have been allowed in the galaxy.

[SPEAKER_02]: And therefore, the Koreans wouldn't have been outcast because of it. [SPEAKER_02]: There's so many little things within the Mass Effect universe that could have gone completely differently. [SPEAKER_01]: Man, now, okay, so I'm looking at the wiki page for the timeline and I'm trying to find exactly when the Citadel rules on AI were implemented and I can't actually find exactly the year, but for everybody's reference, the Ragnar Wars started in the year one of our current era.

[SPEAKER_01]: So, one, a big year for Christianity. [SPEAKER_01]: The... [SPEAKER_01]: But this was obviously far before humans had entered this stage, and it was actually just after relatively just after, first contact was made with the Koreans. [SPEAKER_01]: The Hanar had also been introduced, the Elcore as well as the Beterians, and obviously we had the big three already.

[SPEAKER_01]: We had the Asari, the Turians, and the Celarians on the Council. [SPEAKER_01]: But even with all of that help, [SPEAKER_01]: the rack and I were way too intelligent and way too adept at waging war with the rest of the galaxy that it overwhelmed pretty much everyone else. [SPEAKER_01]: So going back to the question, do I think that the specificity of species would have eventually defeated the rack and I think you bring up that great point about AI and the hesitation to use it?

[SPEAKER_01]: I think as the war got more and more [SPEAKER_01]: those restrictions, those inhibitions that they said it all species and that the Citadel Council implemented would have been repealed very quickly. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, absolutely because they would be reaching and stretching for any type of advantage that they could get whether it was through AI or advanced weaponry going towards, you know, more nuclear options rather than something safe like, you know, just a gunfire battle.

[SPEAKER_01]: Honestly, and the slurians were already significantly advanced as were the Sari and Turians. [SPEAKER_01]: They were already significantly advanced as a species by this point. [SPEAKER_01]: So even without AI because Yukon Cornelius here in Chat mentions that according to Google, AI was outlawed in 1896 of the current era.

[SPEAKER_01]: So not for like 1895 years after that, so maybe they weren't advanced enough to get true AI by that point, but then that raises the question of my mind of [SPEAKER_01]: to deploy on the rack-ni-war worlds, somehow penetrating the deep subterranean caverns where the queens were, perhaps the Selerians would have sponsored a small strike team, right?

[SPEAKER_01]: To go into one of the rack-ni-war worlds, descend into the caverns, knowing it was a suicide mission and deploying some kind of biochemical agent that would have rendered the rack-ni's reproduction completely null. [SPEAKER_02]: Either that or just any form of chemical or biological warfare, you know, some type of deadly virus that could have been airborne specifically genetically engineered to affect the rack not only, you know, it doesn't necessarily have to be something to prevent them from reproducing, but just to kill them outright.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I can imagine that that would actually be an easier task than producing something that exclusively affected Crogan, because the Ragnar are so biologically different from every other race. [SPEAKER_02]: And I mean, once you take out the queen, it's a lot easier to take out the rest of the hive mind.

[SPEAKER_02]: So even if it was only engineered to destroy the queens, [SPEAKER_01]: That's right. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so I don't think that galactic civilization would have collapsed. [SPEAKER_01]: I think that they would have adapted and put their collective minds to it. [SPEAKER_01]: It's just really hard for me to think that the rack now would have overwhelmed everybody.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, but they could have. [SPEAKER_02]: If we had to, if the, if the, if the council races had to pull such a Hail Mary card of uplifting an entire species, which goes against things that they have done in the past, and then has to unleash the entire crow can hoard in order to accomplish the task of beating them, it's also possible that.

[SPEAKER_02]: The citadel races could have won the war, but suffered such devastating losses that it completely changes the arena of the council races. [SPEAKER_01]: That's right, yeah, and we, so for reference, there's by the time the Crogan are uplifted by the Selerians, that's around like a century later after the war had started because the first contact the Selerians make with the Crogan is in the year 80 CE.

[SPEAKER_01]: So 79 years after the Ragnar Wars start, I wish that we had more details about what exactly had transpired between the year 1 and 80 in the Ragnar Wars and what options had been explored and which ones were which failed obviously by that point to fight the Ragnar in which did not because clearly they had 79 years to try out different tactics and all of them were relative failures.

[SPEAKER_01]: because that's why the Solarians ultimately uplift the decrogan. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I mean, 80 years of wars, a very long time to be in to have an entire galaxy's worth of species, armies, planets, all fighting against one common enemy, and they still couldn't do it. [SPEAKER_01]: And for reference, specifically for the Solarians, because they were the ones who made first contact with the Crogon, we learn from Morton, right?

[SPEAKER_01]: The Solarians are lucky to live to about 40. [SPEAKER_01]: or in their 40s. [SPEAKER_01]: So for the war to have already lasted 80 years by this point for the salarians, this is like if a war lasted, you know, like 140, 150 years for human beings. [SPEAKER_02]: It's generational war at that point.

[SPEAKER_01]: Right. [SPEAKER_01]: At that point, yeah, you have like several, [SPEAKER_01]: depending on what Celery and reproductive ages. [SPEAKER_02]: Uh, yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: I don't think we that we know that one, but you know, I think I think that in this case, they were also does forced technology rapid technological advances, because everybody's focused on the next thing.

[SPEAKER_02]: So, and especially with the Celeryians, they would be the ones to bring up that new technology. [SPEAKER_01]: So that kind of, that's a great segue into the next question that I have, which is how would a prolonged rack-ni war have reshaped technology and military development across the galaxy?

[SPEAKER_01]: What, how do you think that that would have changed the galaxy? [SPEAKER_01]: It's trajectory that otherwise went. [SPEAKER_01]: As you were already kind of like leading down that path, I want to take it one step further and I want to say that I think offensive weaponry would have made leaps and bounds as opposed to perhaps defensive like armors and kinetic shielding and things like that because [SPEAKER_01]: They wouldn't really need that against the Ragnide, but they do need weapons of mass destruction.

[SPEAKER_01]: They need weapons that are going to cover a wide area and rain down shotgun off. [SPEAKER_02]: Yes, I definitely see a bigger focus on AOE, area effects, napalms, fire, grenades, anything that's going to cause a widespread damage, and leaning away from single fire. [SPEAKER_02]: So probably snipers are not very effective against rack-ni, unless you're gas-for-carrying, you know, who can fire off multiple shots.

[SPEAKER_02]: just isn't effective. [SPEAKER_01]: That's a great point, too, about small arms. [SPEAKER_01]: I was thinking about large arms, you know, like with the starships and things like that. [SPEAKER_01]: But with small arms, yeah, you'd probably see a proliferation of like, you know, light machine guns, or the, you know, things like the in-seven typhoon, even though it was a human developed one.

[SPEAKER_01]: You probably see a lot of, you know, [SPEAKER_01]: far fewer semi-automatic or single-fire weaponry, I can also imagine that they would probably be developing new bombs that utilized Ezo to affect the mass of different things. [SPEAKER_01]: And this is just, you know, this is totally my Neo-Fi.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not a scientist. [SPEAKER_01]: I've never had a scientific background, right? [SPEAKER_01]: But I'm just liking this idea to explore. [SPEAKER_01]: Can you imagine if there was a possibility, since we do know from the lore that it was so difficult for the Citadel species to penetrate, ha-ha, penetrate, to penetrate the rack-ni world to get underground, to negotiate with the rack-ni queens.

[SPEAKER_01]: A, because the Ragnar were swarming them, and B, because it was toxic. [SPEAKER_01]: They were toxic worlds, and they were underground. [SPEAKER_01]: So with that said, I can see a possibility, or a scenario where the salarians, or the terrians, would perhaps develop a weapon that could alter the mass of the core of a planet.

[SPEAKER_01]: And collapse the planet itself. [SPEAKER_02]: that's like death star level shit and I'm not quite sure it like that, but I can definitely see how that's going, how it could go down that path. [SPEAKER_02]: I could also see the, sorry, generally being the peacekeepers and the peace brokers of the Mass Effect Universe that we do know, [SPEAKER_02]: that they would be the ones developing the technology to make re-brothers or environmental suits, you know, maybe even borrowing information from the volus to try and bring, look, hey, you guys need an environment like this to survive.

[SPEAKER_02]: How can I prevent an environment like this affecting me? [SPEAKER_02]: And then learning how to be able to communicate with the, with the, with the Ragnai. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm just imagining the Asari trying to recruit a team of volus to descend into hell itself on a toxic rack-ni world. [SPEAKER_01]: And then you get like the the the volus team leader like What are we?

[SPEAKER_00]: Some kind of suicide squad. [SPEAKER_00]: But I'd love it. [SPEAKER_00]: I'd love it. [SPEAKER_01]: Hey Thomas you're in Chad and he says I'd play that. [SPEAKER_02]: playing an all-volus game. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm here for it. [SPEAKER_01]: A little volus strike team that the right night.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, they're just rolling. [SPEAKER_01]: And maybe the rack and I are just like so unthreatened by the volus, right, that they're able to just kind of descend into the caverns. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: And I, you know, like that's, I feel like that might also be something that would be a political and cultural implication is the involvement of all the council races working together more cooperatively, because without the crow in there causing hellfire around everything.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's a great point. [SPEAKER_01]: Now, I didn't think about the fact that a shared enemy of such overwhelming might without the possibility of uplifting the Crogan would bring together the other races. [SPEAKER_01]: And come to think about it. [SPEAKER_01]: Now that you mentioned it, the Beterians in particular are very skilled war fighters, right?

[SPEAKER_01]: And now I'm curious about when the Beterians had discovered the Leviathan of dis. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, that wasn't until 2163. [SPEAKER_01]: So there's the argument to be made that the Leviathan of this, since it had not been co-opted and taken to the Beterian home world of, oh man, what is it, Cartion?

[SPEAKER_01]: I'll stop my head, yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: So since that had not happened, there's the argument to be made that the highest echelons of leadership of the Beterian had Jiminy were not indoctrinated yet. [SPEAKER_01]: And so they may have been willing to play ball and kind of bear the brunt of some kind of frontline force.

[SPEAKER_01]: Can you imagine some kind of alternate Mass Effect universe where the battarians are perhaps lauded as heroes for taking so many hits to the chin? [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, a battalion statue instead of the crowgain on the Citadel. [SPEAKER_02]: That would be a very different universe, you know, because then maybe that major first plot hook of shepherd hates battarians wouldn't have been, wouldn't have been a thing.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like, why would shepherd hate them? [SPEAKER_01]: One of it was, uh, shepherd hates crowgans. [SPEAKER_02]: Sheppardate's programs that could definitely be a thing. [SPEAKER_02]: I also want to plant the little seed in your mind just because you brought up Leviathan and indoctrination. [SPEAKER_02]: Play that seed.

[SPEAKER_02]: There is also a theory that all recognize during the Ragnar War were indoctrinated forces. [SPEAKER_01]: right yeah they were they were hearing the sour songs right the sour notes um so of course there is that influence from the reapers um meaning that the reapers could have adjusted their tactics depending on how the Citadel species did that would have been a totally other x-factor that I think would be very hard to game out unless you wanted to go with a number of different [SPEAKER_01]: But I think that, you know, we're talking about the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, right?

[SPEAKER_01]: And as as as capable as the battarians are as capable as the Turians are, again, they were already fighting this war for 79 years before they met the Krogan. [SPEAKER_01]: and they were not making any headway. [SPEAKER_01]: So I think that the progress probably would have leaned more heavily into WMDs and different tactics that would have shifted the galactic economy to award a wartime economy long term.

[SPEAKER_01]: Do you think that had this continued because [SPEAKER_01]: the, I think it's like 300 years total that the Ragnar Wars last. [SPEAKER_01]: And that's after, that's 200, like 200 years after or so after the Slarians uplift the Crogan. [SPEAKER_01]: So it still takes 200 years after that.

[SPEAKER_01]: Do you think that with the several hundred years that it might take without the Crogan [SPEAKER_01]: You know, several hundred years of galactic economy restructured around war would that have pushed Citadel space to where the Thoritarian rule? [SPEAKER_02]: absolutely the council would have looked completely different because for to be in a war status for that long is going to absolutely shape your politics.

[SPEAKER_02]: It is going to shape the way that you fund your military. [SPEAKER_02]: It is going to be the way that you fund the you that you fund any of the [SPEAKER_02]: and nobody's really going to be paying for outreach programs or educating the children through fine arts. [SPEAKER_02]: No, it is all going to be military-based.

[SPEAKER_02]: Everybody is being raised in order to fight in the more. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, well, and I can imagine rationing widespread rationing because the rack and I would have inevitably targeted bread basket worlds, right? [SPEAKER_01]: Humanity was not here to help out yet. [SPEAKER_01]: So although humanity has very capable military, capable of adapting to different worlds and different things like that, they were not there for the X-Factor.

[SPEAKER_01]: You still have this relative oligarchy. [SPEAKER_01]: I feel like you can call it with the Citadel Council. [SPEAKER_01]: That is highly concentrated power in just a few different people, individuals, although they represent the interests of their species. [SPEAKER_01]: So I feel like that is really setting itself up for a further consolidation of power into like a primarct like the Turins already have.

[SPEAKER_01]: what were the other historical terms for emperor besides emperor, right, you know, like a high counselor or some kind of consolidation of power so that they could reorganize and mobilize at quicker with fewer debates. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it's not going to be a council of peers who are debating morality or trying to, you know, it's not going to be a democracy type thing where your constituents are voting and you bring what your people want to the table.

[SPEAKER_02]: No, this is a war council where everybody is trying to debate to best tactics. [SPEAKER_01]: And the other thing is, like, you don't have the other veterans from other wars that we did in our own universe after the Ragnar Wars, right? [SPEAKER_01]: So you don't have the institutional knowledge about how to fight a hive mind species in this cycle anyway, because as far as I know, the Ragnar Wars were the first major, like [SPEAKER_01]: So, we don't, they don't know, no one knows how to adapt quite yet, and it's an inherently different kind of intelligence than everybody else has.

[SPEAKER_02]: and anything else that we see while the guests are a hive mind, they definitely don't work the same way that the rack and I do because it's not one centralized later than telling its minions what to do, they just all are able to share all the knowledge all the time. [SPEAKER_02]: It's not necessarily a hive mind.

[SPEAKER_01]: I can also see as the species struggle to adapt to that kind of thing, and power was consolidated out of necessity from a wartime economy, that there would be more and more domestic interspecies conflicts in the Milky Way. [SPEAKER_01]: you know, for the civilians whose lives were changed for so long, inevitably civil liberties would be clamped down.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure sedition laws would be enacted, right? [SPEAKER_01]: That kind of, although it's kind of a hard, hard, hard pill to swallow, trying to convince someone that they're harboring and assisting an enemy when it's like clear whether someone's a rack nire. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, I don't think people are really going to be harboring Rack Nye, but unless, well, I mean, I guess you could.

[SPEAKER_02]: Now that I'm really thinking about it, like if you were a planet, it was already a Rack Nye planet, and you had some form of understanding with them, you already knew how to communicate them and sing with them. [SPEAKER_02]: sing to their song and your species coexisted with them. [SPEAKER_02]: I could see that, but I don't know of any current council species that we know of that have that.

[SPEAKER_01]: Let's talk about the Crogon, right? [SPEAKER_01]: Because if they weren't uplifted, then what are they doing? [SPEAKER_01]: But what path do you think Crogon civilization would have taken if they were never uplifted? [SPEAKER_01]: Because they keep in mind before the Selerians made [SPEAKER_02]: Right.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that that's just whatever the natural outcome was supposed to be for them, you know, surviving through that, then developing technology on their own. [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I think that the Crogan would have eventually rallied return and gone with their what was supposed to be their normal process.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that I think that after a given amount of time, I think politically the Crogon would have rallied around leaders who championed in cooperation. [SPEAKER_01]: with different tribes because they would realize we cannot do this alone. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, the resources are simply dwindling on this planet and our time is limited.

[SPEAKER_01]: You know, we cannot keep doing this fighting tribe by tribe. [SPEAKER_01]: No one's coming to help us. [SPEAKER_01]: We have to do it ourselves. [SPEAKER_01]: And so I feel like we may have seen if if the salarians had not metled. [SPEAKER_01]: If the salarians had not uplifted them. [SPEAKER_01]: I feel like we would have seen a new [SPEAKER_01]: in some kind of program political enlightenment, so to speak.

[SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely. [SPEAKER_02]: I think that they would have stayed on Tuchanka longer and not developed space travel as rapidly, but they would still have achieved their own technological advances. [SPEAKER_02]: They would have made something to help correct their atmosphere. [SPEAKER_02]: They would have made something to help correct the soil and be able to farm and do all those things rather than what the Solerians just gave [SPEAKER_02]: Because Eve talks about the old days when the clans only thought when needed not just because they were aggressive, you know, fighters that there were times when the clans would get together and have peace and that's why there are the sacred lands because they had been established beforehand.

[SPEAKER_01]: right. [SPEAKER_01]: And without the genophage, we don't have that that other external factor that shakes the bedrock of like Crogon's social status quo. [SPEAKER_01]: We don't have something dividing the Crogon amongst each other further than they already were. [SPEAKER_01]: So [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I feel like we're probably in agreement here that without the uplifting Crogens civilization, it may have taken a while.

[SPEAKER_01]: However, I think that they would have advanced to a point where they gain space flight, they go ahead and start colonizing other worlds, however, [SPEAKER_01]: the dogma and the ideology surrounding leadership and who gets to be a leader is far different. [SPEAKER_01]: It's not dictated by the strong are the only ones worthy, because for how many hundreds of years were the strong ones, the leaders, and had just led to more fighting.

[SPEAKER_01]: So I think the results would have convinced every program and the subsequent improvement of quality of life would have convinced all of the program under those leaders who are cooperative that they were in a good spot without the fighting. [SPEAKER_01]: Now, do you think? [SPEAKER_01]: by the end of whatever rack-knife wars that happened would they have become a galactic power on their own?

[SPEAKER_01]: Or do you think that they would have some kind of catalysts would have happened and they destroyed themselves before reaching spaceflight? [SPEAKER_02]: No, I don't think so because even in the time of Mass Effect that we see them now, where they've, you know, done a lot of inviting and they have been unlifted, uplifted, there are still Crogon scientists, there are still Crogon matriarchs, there are still people who are [SPEAKER_02]: not battle hungry, there are a lot of crowgans who are not reave like, there are more crowgans who are wrecks like.

[SPEAKER_01]: Right, and Rex's popularity even though it's later kind of proves this point, right? [SPEAKER_01]: Because Rex is as graphize as only exterior, Rex is someone known for cooperating and wanting peace among tribes. [SPEAKER_01]: So maybe with a headbutt or two, but still, you know, Rex is who he is.

[SPEAKER_01]: So I think nothing's changing fundamentally about [SPEAKER_01]: Sociology, right? [SPEAKER_01]: Nothing has changed substantially about that beyond the genophage and our own, like in our own, in, in, in our own, going to quote, timeline for mass effect. [SPEAKER_01]: So without the genophage without uplifting them, yeah, I do see a politician like Rex becoming popular at some point.

[SPEAKER_01]: How about the rac nigh, right? [SPEAKER_01]: How would the rac nigh have changed? [SPEAKER_01]: Do you think that without the crow can leading the spear or a tip, you know, being the tip of the spear and exterminating them, could the rac nigh have eventually maybe settled and negotiated peace?

[SPEAKER_02]: I think that that has a lot to do with whether or not the reapers were being the ones holding the puppet strings. [SPEAKER_02]: Because if the reapers were there going, no, I want you to take over this galaxy and start implanting indoctrination already, you know, even 300 years, what is it, 300 years in the past from, oh no, 2000 years in the past, from where shepherds.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's right, more than 2100 years. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: Okay. [SPEAKER_02]: So, even if you're starting to plant the seeds of indoctrination or knowing having the rack died going and saying, this species, this species and this species are going to be the ones that are going to attack, we don't know how long the reapers are in their pre-planning session.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, we don't have, we don't have a previous cycle to really look back on and go, [SPEAKER_02]: So, I think that the rack that I could be there helping the reapers out and not really having a choice in the matter. [SPEAKER_01]: I think that really gets to the heart of the issue, which is that is the recognize aggression inevitable or was it purely because of the reapers influence.

[SPEAKER_01]: Uh, and I think that the lore actually supports that it was only because of the reaper influence, and also that the queens, the Ragnai Queen, did not have control over her own children. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think that right there is exactly why the Ragnai Wars continued for as long as they did.

[SPEAKER_01]: So, we learn from the Ragnet Queen. [SPEAKER_01]: I think it's in Mass Effect 3. [SPEAKER_01]: Correct me if I'm wrong, it's 1 or 3. [SPEAKER_01]: But I think it's in Mass Effect 3. [SPEAKER_01]: We learn that basically the Ragnet Queen was unable to reach her Ragnet children. [SPEAKER_01]: and their communications, which are based off of songs and ferramones, was basically polluted.

[SPEAKER_01]: That link between the Queen and her children was severed and intercepted by the Reapers. [SPEAKER_01]: And so I think, if somehow the Mass Effect Citadel species were able to infiltrate those subterranean tunnels to get to the Ragnac queens, they may have been able, the Ragnac queens may have been able to advise the other Citadel species on how to bring about and to the war.

[SPEAKER_01]: uh, as well as, you know, like keeping the Rack Nile live. [SPEAKER_01]: So they may have exterminated all the Rack Nile children, but the Rack Nile queens would survive. [SPEAKER_01]: And so the species would survive. [SPEAKER_01]: As it already did, of course, in Mass Effect universe, but it would have survived at a more sustainable level and with the galactic stamp of approval.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I agree. [SPEAKER_02]: I think that if we would, if they would have been able to speak to the queens, it could have made a difference unless the queens were too far under indoctrination and were, you know, if you can't reach somebody, you can't reach them. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, I don't know.

[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, it's fun to think about now. [SPEAKER_01]: We've got a number of other questions. [SPEAKER_01]: We're halfway through the show, and we do have some things to discuss in the mid-Break. [SPEAKER_01]: So let's hop over to the mid-Break, and we'll be right back. [SPEAKER_05]: We have beef, bacon, we have beer, the foods of my people.

[SPEAKER_07]: Young men have funny ideas of what a story are like. [SPEAKER_07]: I blame the extra net, and computer games, [SPEAKER_03]: Rex, shepherd, grunt, shepherd, Rex, grunt. [SPEAKER_01]: All right, here we are in the middle of the show. [SPEAKER_01]: And this is where we read out your five-star reviews.

[SPEAKER_01]: All of those reviews that you guys leave us, they help us immensely. [SPEAKER_01]: They help us in terms of algorithm, in terms of showing up earlier on people's feeds, for suggestions and things like that. [SPEAKER_01]: It also helps me and Genesis mentally when we read these kind things that you write.

[SPEAKER_01]: Or if you have, you know, different critiques and different things that you'd like to see or things that you think maybe we should change, we're always open to hearing those too. [SPEAKER_01]: Now we do have Genesis, we do have one new comment on Apple Podcasts from Alex of Kovier, Five Star Review, and it says, I'm Commander Shepherd, and this is my favorite podcast on the Citadel.

[SPEAKER_01]: I love this podcast. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm newer to the games, but love them very much, played them loads in legendary edition. [SPEAKER_01]: The hosts know what they are talking about, and no matter your level of knowledge, new, or long time player, you will always learn something new. [SPEAKER_01]: They give a great understanding of the universe, and a better, apparently, of the work.

[SPEAKER_01]: Not to mention all of the other podcasts on robots, radios, network. [SPEAKER_01]: Keep up, keep doing the great work, and hack it out. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, Alex, thank you so much. [SPEAKER_01]: Genesis, anything you'd like to say? [SPEAKER_01]: uh... user from kovir well i am from to ston was our which are references okay i was gonna say wait i don't get this so i'm out of the loop for once all right well thank you again alex uh... and for everyone listening if you'd like to help out leave us a review you can do it on apple podcasts or spotify spotify allows comments now [SPEAKER_01]: so just go ahead and drop a comment on our most recent episode and we might read it out on the next week.

[SPEAKER_01]: That said, Genesis, I have a sound file from you that is titled dinner first and it is a voice line that I have to guess. [SPEAKER_01]: I have no idea what this is going to be. [SPEAKER_01]: I feel like it's going to be some kind of a new window in my water, such a stupid joke. [SPEAKER_01]: All right.

[SPEAKER_01]: So dinner first. [SPEAKER_01]: All right. [SPEAKER_01]: Here it is. [SPEAKER_08]: If you expect to get me in a 10-foil mini skirt and thigh high boots, I want dinner first. [SPEAKER_08]: Sir. [SPEAKER_01]: Sir. [SPEAKER_01]: Nice. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I love that line. [SPEAKER_01]: Um, that is obviously Ashley Williams.

[SPEAKER_01]: Smashly as some might call her. [SPEAKER_01]: And that is, I want to say on the Citadel ambient dialogue, [SPEAKER_01]: ambient meaning like if uh... you're walking around in the environment and you click something to interact as opposed to like a cutscene in the of itself uh... okay i will give it to you it's not it is a it's a dialogue choice cutscene where uh... it's you actually in caden right at that moment comes from the same scene as big place right [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, right or not, not big place right or is a big place.

[SPEAKER_01]: They're standing at the viewport on the wars. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so that is big place. [SPEAKER_01]: So yes big place. [SPEAKER_01]: Is that your professional opinion. [SPEAKER_01]: Let's in it. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm a nerd. [SPEAKER_01]: I need to get out more. [SPEAKER_01]: love that line.

[SPEAKER_01]: And we do have some new patrons to shout out. [SPEAKER_01]: These are people have signed up on the Patreon. [SPEAKER_01]: Rocks, Arten signing up on a tier 5 in 7 operative member. [SPEAKER_01]: And we also have the Frosty Russian becoming a colonist member on the Patreon. [SPEAKER_01]: So we've got Rocks and the Frosty [SPEAKER_01]: Add it to the list of bans names list of bans names rocks in the frosty Russian.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'll let you guys decide what kind of music you want to make, but I'm I'm saying rocks in the frosty Russian is either a great alternative band or a polka band so we'll see [SPEAKER_01]: it looks like rocks is here in the twitch chat tonight so hello hi rocks that's it going uh... so thank you both so much for supporting this show uh... and we also have some other supporters that we want to shout out our tier five patrons that we shout out every week day [SPEAKER_01]: Buds, Buds, Buds, Reds Robot, Superfly, or 40, Edboy, Kira C, Lieutenant Susino, and William.

[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much, guys, for the continued support of this show. [SPEAKER_01]: You guys make this show possible. [SPEAKER_01]: If you're listening to this and you'd like to help out and you're able and willing, you can go to patreon.com slash Mass Effect Lore test. [SPEAKER_01]: And if you still want to support the show, [SPEAKER_01]: And, but your fan, if I can answer their tight, God knows, I know that's like, uh, then you can go ahead and just talk to a friend, you know, if you know a friend that likes Mass Effect, go bug them, be like, hey, have you listened to this podcast or have you seen these videos on YouTube and that honestly that that does, uh, [SPEAKER_01]: that does wonders for spreading the mass-fect more cast.

[SPEAKER_01]: So all right, with that, I think that's pretty much it. [SPEAKER_01]: Let's get back to the second half of the show. [SPEAKER_04]: After time and drift among open stars alongside the light and through shows of dust, I will return to where I began. [SPEAKER_06]: Celery and reproduction different, very little sex drive.

[SPEAKER_06]: If intended to try human, would try you. [SPEAKER_06]: Ow, my bakeries. [SPEAKER_01]: All right, here we are in the second half of the show. [SPEAKER_01]: Now we left off talking about was the rack and I aggression inevitable. [SPEAKER_01]: But I also want to like take a way bigger picture now.

[SPEAKER_01]: Zoom way out. [SPEAKER_01]: And let's talk about the cycle. [SPEAKER_01]: the current cycle that we're in in the Milky Way. [SPEAKER_01]: If the Crogon had never been uplifted, if they were never the ex-factor in the Ragni Wars, would the reapers have eventually encountered a weaker fractured galaxy if the Ragni War had never truly ended, or had extended for so many hundreds of years.

[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, so I guess it comes back to the question of, did the Rack Nye win or did a very war-hardened council finally to feed them? [SPEAKER_01]: Well, let's, let's game out each scenario, right? [SPEAKER_01]: So let's assume that the Rack Nye won. [SPEAKER_01]: Considering how easy it was for the Reapers to on-mass indoctrinate the Rack Nye, [SPEAKER_01]: I'm just going to say that the reapers would have like waltest on in, and encountered very little resistance.

[SPEAKER_02]: A great. [SPEAKER_02]: I think the cycle would have ended very quickly with the Rack Nye in control. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, because they were already proven to be especially susceptible to the effects of indoctrination. [SPEAKER_01]: Now if the Rack Nye had not won, [SPEAKER_01]: and the galactic economy and the galactic political sphere had been shaped by war hardened, authoritarian rule for so long.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm also going to say that this would have made the Reaper's job significantly easier, as we learned from Javik, because Javik tells us of how centralized the protein government was. [SPEAKER_01]: And once they cut off the head of the snake, once the [SPEAKER_02]: I agree, I think that it would have been a very destabilized council, you know, I think with a whole bunch of leaders being very, even if battle hardened to start with, but also very war weary at that point.

[SPEAKER_02]: if they had one at great cost to all of the species, the idea of getting into another galactic scale war with an insurmountable enemy is going to be absolutely defeated like just from a from a mental standpoint. [SPEAKER_01]: Hmm. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Now, okay. [SPEAKER_01]: I want to play Devils Advocate or perhaps re-pres Advocate here and say, [SPEAKER_01]: let's assume that the effects of the rack-ni-war were as they were they did make a war hardened society they did lead to significant advancements in weaponry and tactics before they otherwise would have perhaps AI and other WMDs were created far before when they would have been otherwise.

[SPEAKER_01]: Um, but I still think that the Citadel species would have had thousands of years, right, to progress socially and politically after the end of a rack-ni war's scenario. [SPEAKER_01]: uh... so perhaps they would have decentralized the authority and the government maybe there would have been some fracturing because of the war weariness uh... maybe there would have been some kind of uh... fracturing back into uh... democratic city states uh... level of government but extrapolate that instead of city states will make a planet states right um... that kind of confederation [SPEAKER_01]: and perhaps the Citadel Council would have had less power afterward, perhaps after a series of abuses of power were brought to light.

[SPEAKER_01]: I think in such a scenario where the power was decentralized, the wartime economy, the legacy was there, so the industrial capacity was there, and the technology had progressed to a point where different weapons and different tactics had become more widespread, [SPEAKER_01]: uh... pair that up with the decentralized governmental forces i think that the galaxy may have been even better off to fight the reaper threat then they would have otherwise they would have had these weapons like you know weaponized a.i.a.

[SPEAKER_01]: they would have had the weapons like maybe that that i'd suggest it about collapsing a plan it's core that would have significantly spread uh... uh... reduced the reaper invasion they couldn't use ground forces if that were the case [SPEAKER_02]: You're right. [SPEAKER_02]: You're right.

[SPEAKER_02]: I agree because I wasn't really putting in the time frame into that. [SPEAKER_02]: It's not like we're going immediately from one more directly into the next one. [SPEAKER_02]: So there's a significant amount of time to recover, recuperate, and change things. [SPEAKER_02]: I do think that the Terrians would have been even more militarized because they were already the main [SPEAKER_02]: galactic force and then so now that's that's times 10 at this point is the Crogon never got involved and I think that they would have great genetic and technological advances, you know, maybe we're seeing a more cyber punked, you know, a more cybert out version of the of the Terriens incorporating anything that they can in order to make themselves more skilled and able to fighters.

[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, give me garrison, but with more chrome. [SPEAKER_02]: Exactly, screw a carapace, I want a full body armor, you know. [SPEAKER_02]: uh... the salarians and like to talk about earlier with the quarriens and creating this a.i. [SPEAKER_02]: maybe the salarians would then be helping them to develop that even better you know having so maybe we do have a guest army that is still under quarry and control or separate but not worrying with the quarriens [SPEAKER_02]: Uh, and so I think that the council would then become even more authoritarian and being more defense focused rather than, uh, you know, where they are now as kind of like peace keepers lawmakers rule the fighters.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, perhaps, yeah, I can see that that scenario where the Citadel council essentially functions [SPEAKER_01]: then a governing body. [SPEAKER_01]: That would be really interesting alternate universe, and I feel like that would mean the Citadel would be far less populated, perhaps the economy would not be, you wouldn't have the same amount of, uh, not globalism, but I guess galacticism with different goods being exchanged, right?

[SPEAKER_01]: Um, but had the quarry and still created the death, [SPEAKER_01]: then my guess is they would not have tasked the death with menial tasks and making the death as a labor force so much as they would have made the death kind of defense and protector force which means there are integral programming would have always been we need to protect the organic species at all costs.

[SPEAKER_02]: So that gives us a very different guess than what we know right now. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, what if that eventually led to something like the AI and the catalyst that the Leviathan's made? [SPEAKER_01]: Because if I remember right, the Leviathan's tasks, their AI with the preservation of organic species above all else, which created the Reapers.

[SPEAKER_02]: Oh god, okay, now we're gonna get into a whole cycle within a cycle that we end up creating our own Reapers. [SPEAKER_01]: Meta Reapers. [SPEAKER_02]: Meta Reapers. [SPEAKER_01]: We create the meta-reapers to fight the Reapers and then we're then we're just in a different cycle governed by even stronger Reapers.

[SPEAKER_02]: Uh, the Reapers reapers squared, uh, the reapening part two. [SPEAKER_02]: The reapening. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so obviously we've talked most of this episode without even mentioning Shepard, right? [SPEAKER_01]: But let's talk about Shepard. [SPEAKER_01]: The 21 [SPEAKER_01]: 80s. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't think Shepard would have been necessarily as relevant.

[SPEAKER_01]: There's, of course, you could write it either way, but would humanity have entered a stable Citadel community? [SPEAKER_01]: Would the first contact war have gone the way that did? [SPEAKER_01]: Or would it have discovered some kind of fractured post-war galaxy after discovering the Mass Effect relays?

[SPEAKER_02]: Hmm, so that went to me, I don't know. [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, so I'm thinking if we travel through the relay and we meet the Turing's first, there's a possibility of, oh my god, another species that could help in any future warfronts or, oh no, it's another invading species we are going to go even harder than what we did in that original in what we canonized [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, yeah, well, would the Turians' response have been as it was, you know, with humanity?

[SPEAKER_01]: So, the reason why the Turians reacted the way that they did with the relay 314 is because of the legacy of the Ragnar War, that they [SPEAKER_01]: the reason why it's not okay to go around activating relays wheelie nilly is because that's how the rack nigh were unleashed upon the galaxy.

[SPEAKER_01]: Now in this universe where the galactic order somehow was preserved, but the crogan never ended the rack nigh wars, the wars ended somehow, [SPEAKER_01]: then there would still be the hesitation of opening up mass relays, uh, willy-nilly. [SPEAKER_01]: However, I think maybe the Turians wouldn't be the peacekeepers that they were, uh, before the Rackknife Wars, who knows what kind of numbers were decimated, uh, or, [SPEAKER_01]: in an even perhaps more interesting scenario.

[SPEAKER_01]: The rack and I won, right? [SPEAKER_01]: But humanity was never involved, and the caron relay was never discovered, not before the end of the rack and I was. [SPEAKER_01]: So by the time the caron relay is discovered and on earth, and John Grissom goes in there with his team. [SPEAKER_01]: They go through the relay and immediately find worlds and worlds full of recognized swarms and they're like never mind turn off the relay close it burned all down [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I'm turning back around at that point.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yep. [SPEAKER_02]: No, we're going straight back home. [SPEAKER_02]: We're going to go to the endromeda galaxy instead because we're not dealing with the next galaxy over. [SPEAKER_01]: And I feel like that probably would have stifled any motivation for advancing human space flight. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, to go outside of our galaxy, if all we know that what's out there is a bunch of, you know, an alien race that only wants to communicate through song waves and that seems to, you know, want to take over everything.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, no, I don't like this idea. [SPEAKER_01]: So humanity may have become more isolationist, may have become more motivated by fear. [SPEAKER_01]: That kind of sounds like the perfect breathing round for server as ideology, or some kind of human supremacist ideology. [SPEAKER_01]: Uh, I can also see some kind of future universe for humanity where if the raconide one, we get with humanity, we get something akin to hell divers.

[SPEAKER_02]: Okay. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, yeah, we're our entire reason for living is only to go and fight the bug, fight the bugs for democracy. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: For democracy, held divers. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: And the irony is, of course, you know, for, I guess for those who don't know, Helldivers is a satire on like space fascism.

[SPEAKER_01]: It is what it is. [SPEAKER_01]: And so I think that if the rat and I had won, it would have radically restructured how humanity's own defense and government worked. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it would be Starship Troopers. [SPEAKER_02]: We would, it would be Starship Troopers in a video game.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, which perhaps not that interesting actually, perhaps too cliché at this point for 2007 media. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so there's a couple of different moral and ethical questions we should address. [SPEAKER_01]: Everything we've talked about. [SPEAKER_01]: Does that mean that uplifting the Crogon was morally justified?

[SPEAKER_01]: Even with our retrospective having known about the later Crogon rebellions in the [SPEAKER_02]: Ugh, that's just a morality that I don't know if I can truly get into because [SPEAKER_02]: I only know what I know because I was there at the end outcome. [SPEAKER_02]: If you're asking me to make this decision in the moment as if I were a salarian and a deterrent discussing this conversation of do we uplift, like that I don't ever want to be a part of these major life-changing, world-changing species changing decisions.

[SPEAKER_02]: I wouldn't uplift them. [SPEAKER_02]: But that's only knowing everything that I know that comes after that. [SPEAKER_01]: Right. [SPEAKER_01]: I think if we assume that we know everything about those rebellions in the genufage and how Crogan society is by 2183, obviously it's easy to say no uplifting them was not justified.

[SPEAKER_01]: However, Retrobot and Chad here brings up a good point. [SPEAKER_01]: Imagine if the salarians had uplifted the humans instead. [SPEAKER_01]: So, and not just the humans, imagine if they had chosen any different race. [SPEAKER_01]: Toplift. [SPEAKER_01]: Perhaps the Yag. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_02]: Okay. [SPEAKER_02]: So, I don't think that the reason that they went with the Crogan is because the Crogan were already technologically close. [SPEAKER_02]: If they were having some form of nuclear war on their planet, that means that they were light years ahead of where we were. [SPEAKER_02]: This was year one on our earth.

[SPEAKER_02]: We were not there at all. [SPEAKER_02]: And so uplifting us at that point would have been way too much of a culture shock, way too far advanced. [SPEAKER_02]: Even if our population would have been what it would have been within three, four billion at that point, maybe, I don't even know, no.

[SPEAKER_01]: No, no. [SPEAKER_01]: Humanity's population was not three billion by the year one when the Rack Night Wars started. [SPEAKER_02]: OK, the estimated crogan population per Google prior to the Racknoy Roars was 2.1 billion. [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, and so. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, significantly higher.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so I don't think that the salarians would have picked the humans. [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know about the yag and where they would have been in that same time frame. [SPEAKER_02]: I think the reason that they went with the crowgain is because they were the only ones that fit the requirements.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think that they may have just decided to uplift some other species. [SPEAKER_01]: Like, if not the Crogon, then they would have just uplifted maybe someone else. [SPEAKER_01]: Because clearly the desire was there. [SPEAKER_01]: But you bring up a great point about the circumstances for uplifting, were particularly fitting for the Crogon in the eyes of salarians anyway.

[SPEAKER_01]: Um, so, okay, so that's, that brings up a much larger question in terms of all sci-fi. [SPEAKER_01]: Is it ever ethical to engineer or weaponize one species to save another or one species to save all slew of other species? [SPEAKER_01]: Is it ethical to do that? [SPEAKER_02]: Ah, yes, no.

[SPEAKER_02]: give me an exact scenario and I'll give you my opinion on it. [SPEAKER_02]: I guess maybe sorry to be so wishy watching on these ones, but ethical questions are one of those ones where my brain will pick apart everything before I can make a decision on it. [SPEAKER_02]: And I think in this case, uplifting the Crogan.

[SPEAKER_02]: knowing everything that we know, I don't feel like it was ethical, but in the moment I could see how that decision was justified, and I can see how it could be justified each and every time where there's somebody willing, able, and capable of providing help, and I have the means to [SPEAKER_01]: I saw that you can here in chat said if they've read it, which is exactly what I was going to say that I think it is ethical to engineer or weaponize one species to save another or multiple others.

[SPEAKER_01]: If that species, if you present that option to them, and they collectively agree. [SPEAKER_02]: That way you're still allowing your room to breathe. [SPEAKER_01]: Right, like don't force it on them. [SPEAKER_01]: But I feel like that way you're still honoring their self-determination. [SPEAKER_01]: that way.

[SPEAKER_01]: And just saying, look, you know, you can decide not to be uplifted and continue to live your guys' lives in peace outside of this war that we're having, but we really need your help and we can do this to make you guys even stronger. [SPEAKER_01]: But it's going to mean a lot of war and a lot of death.

[SPEAKER_01]: And you know, pitch the idea to their leadership right and then let their leadership hopefully discuss it among the populists. [SPEAKER_01]: And maybe you can come to some kind of conclusion that way. [SPEAKER_01]: But then the other side of that coin is whatever the decision you got to honor it.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: And the big thing is that getting an entire species to agree on something like that because it is in all or nothing. [SPEAKER_02]: We can't say, oh, these three countries, cities, lands are going to be uplifted in the rest of the planet. [SPEAKER_02]: It's not. [SPEAKER_02]: Once your shown spaceflight capabilities, once your shown advanced weapon technology, once you know for a concrete fact that alien races exist outside of your home planet, there is no way to unplay that card.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's a great point. [SPEAKER_01]: Once the secret's out, it's out. [SPEAKER_01]: All right, well, we're near the end, and I just have one more point that I'd like for us to discuss. [SPEAKER_01]: We were talking a little bit earlier about the effects of the Racken Eye Awards without the Crogan, and perhaps it would lead to a decentralized kind of galaxy where we might have isolated relay regions [SPEAKER_01]: and it would create different civilizations across space.

[SPEAKER_01]: We were also discussing, you know, the proliferation of WMDs. [SPEAKER_01]: Now, there are giant possible WMDs in pretty much every cluster. [SPEAKER_01]: The mass relays had the Citadel species discovered how to blow up a relay, [SPEAKER_02]: effectively provided them the means of containing the rack-knife rep. That is very true, and I'm sorry, my mind also spiraled with the fact that you were talking about these weapons of mass destruction, and you were talking earlier about the Turians developing a planet destroying weapon, they already have, they planted that bomb onto [SPEAKER_02]: right, but so that proves that if they had been more focused on making planetary bombs rather than fighting alongside the Crogon, they could have developed that earlier.

[SPEAKER_01]: They could have, yes. [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm also thinking about what if they went the Ralloy route of everything else was failing we have to blow up our own relays. [SPEAKER_01]: and somehow I hope that our planets are far enough away from them that they don't get destroyed. [SPEAKER_02]: I do think that sabotaging the relays would have become a viable and possible outcome to make it difficult for anybody to travel through their space.

[SPEAKER_02]: It would have cut everybody off from everybody, but that is a possibility. [SPEAKER_01]: Which would have also thrown the reaper's plans into total disarray. [SPEAKER_02]: very much so. [SPEAKER_02]: Uh, and that begs that question that I asked several weeks ago, are there keepers on the relays?

[SPEAKER_01]: Who knows, I don't know, actually. [SPEAKER_01]: There might be there might not be, but it would certainly make sense if there were. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, because then the keepers would just start rebuilding everything. [SPEAKER_01]: definitely. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, we have discussed a lot today and I feel like we have more questions than we started with, but this has been another really fun what if episode.

[SPEAKER_01]: Genesis any final thoughts? [SPEAKER_02]: I love the quote. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, actually my last thought is, would grunt even be around if the [SPEAKER_01]: No, Warlord O'Keyer would not have gone down the route that Warlord O'Keyer did. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I don't think our little tank baby would exist.

[SPEAKER_01]: Satch. [SPEAKER_02]: Super Satch. [SPEAKER_02]: But yeah, no, that was my last little thought. [SPEAKER_01]: All right, well, this has been a really great what if episode as always, we want to hear your guys' thoughts and your opinions, maybe have other ideas about what kind of ideas we could game out for a future week of the Mass Effect Lorcaz, where we talk about a what if blank happened in the Mass Effect universe.

[SPEAKER_01]: I've had a lot of fun discussing this. [SPEAKER_01]: I can't wait until we do our next one. [SPEAKER_01]: However, we're going to get back to the definitive lore. [SPEAKER_01]: Next week, I don't think we've decided on what specifically to talk about, but maybe that's for the best. [SPEAKER_01]: We'll keep everybody on their toes.

[SPEAKER_01]: Until next week, Genesis, what do you got going on? [SPEAKER_01]: How can people go to the hole to you? [SPEAKER_01]: Anything you want to shout out? [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it is Valentine's Week, and that's always a special episode for The Girls, my podcast on video game romance, two girls' one chip, and this year we're doing a very special gathering of all of my podcasting friends.

[SPEAKER_02]: The the cut from the Dragon Age lore cast, the Nassassin's Creed lore cast, are going to be joining me in Vervada, [SPEAKER_02]: along with Toasty and Ben from the Witcher lorecast and, of course, Sam from the Mass Effect lorecast to talk about all of our favorite romances in the video games that we have podcasts for.

[SPEAKER_02]: So, that should be a lot of fun. [SPEAKER_01]: no one's gonna guess who I'm gonna talk about there. [SPEAKER_01]: So that will be a blast. [SPEAKER_01]: I can't wait for that. [SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, if anyone is going to be curious about Mass Effect Romances or other video game romances, go check out that episode.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I also have gotten back to streaming. [SPEAKER_01]: I streamed today. [SPEAKER_01]: I streamed to Fallout New Vegas. [SPEAKER_01]: I downloaded a massive mod list. [SPEAKER_01]: 1,503 mods for Fallout New Vegas, as well as the tail of two wastelands mod, where basically it puts Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas in the same game.

[SPEAKER_01]: it's just been an absolute blast to play and kind of go back and experience some of that classic fallout with a little bit of modernized graphics. [SPEAKER_01]: It's still kind of rough, but it's been fun playing a very goody two-shoes character and it's an extremely hard core mod list.

[SPEAKER_01]: So very difficult need to eat, drink, sleep, that kind of thing, high damage from every enemy and everything [SPEAKER_01]: So that's been very fun. [SPEAKER_01]: I want to continue streaming that. [SPEAKER_01]: Go follow me at in 7th of the legend on Twitch. [SPEAKER_01]: Same handle, pretty much anywhere else I am.

[SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, besides that, and going on your show, and our show, that's all I got for this coming week. [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, and I guess like training my dog, continuing to train Aegon, who is joining me, [SPEAKER_01]: my dog is joining me on those fallout new Vegas streams as dog meat. [SPEAKER_01]: He's a German shepherd for everyone who doesn't know.

[SPEAKER_01]: So he's kind of like the perfect standard. [SPEAKER_01]: And I am a stand-in for vault boy. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Because I look like vault boy. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: there you go. [SPEAKER_01]: All right, guys. [SPEAKER_01]: That's it. [SPEAKER_01]: That's all we got for this week and until next time Specters think twice before you genetically engineer another species for your own means.

[SPEAKER_01]: All right. [SPEAKER_01]: Take care, everybody. [SPEAKER_01]: Thanks for listening to the Mass Effect War text. [SPEAKER_01]: Reach out to us on Blue Sky, Twitter, Discord, Patreon, or email us at Mass EffectLorecast at gmail.com. [SPEAKER_02]: Join us next week for more lore, same space, same time.

[SPEAKER_02]: Or check out our live streams at twitch.tv slash Mass Effect Warcast.

234: What If... the krogan NEVER fought off the rachni?

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