We Were So WRONG About the RACHNI...
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- Опубликовано: 26 июл 2024
- Of all the alien races we meet in the Mass Effect universe, the story of the Rachni is one of the most mysterious and interesting. But the fate of the Rachni and their motivations in the Rachni Wars still leave us with a lot of unanswered questions. So we'll be covering all of that in this video.
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If you save the Rachni Queen both times, there is an e-mail that you get from one of the Crucible Project Directors that describes how ships of initially unknown origin showed up at the crucible. After the defensive systems finally matched the profile of the ships to ancient Rachni designs one ship was hesitantly allowed to land on the Crucible construction site and immediately a swarm of Rachni drones came out. They were docile though, and showed no signs of aggression. When they were allowed into the larger station they immediately began helping with the construction efforts. The director mentioned that they still freak many people out, but their integration efforts were so seamless that they boosted construction efficiency drastically.
It seems pretty obvious that the Rachni Queen made good on her promise, and were committed to the cause of peace.
Yeah the Rachnii queen sends rachnii to help build the Crucible if you save her both times.
Both times?
@Keulron I believe if you save her the first time it opens up a side mission in the later games where the reapers are trying to get control of them again and they need your help one more time. I also think it's tied to Grunt in some way
@@magmadude35 I think that mission happens even if you kill her the first time, but then the Reapers build their own queen and if you let _that_ one loose on the crucible the drones wreak havoc instead.
You are right. Still it's a difficult decision in ME1 for anyone who was paying attention to the Codex and/or tours of the citadel, it's a choice between genocide, or letting loose an alien race with a proven track record in killing everyone around them.
I always save the rachni.
Same
Me too
Same, it seems bit hypocritical to be fighting against the genocide of the reapers, only to dole out genocide.
I used to save the rachni, but when you think about it why would you want preserve a race of space cockroaches that threaten to take over the galaxy? Due to their hive mind structure if their queen is compromised the workers will follow every command. It just feels like saving the rachni is simply kicking a future problem down the road.
The only good bug is a dead bug. The only way to be sure is to nuke them from orbit.
In mass Effect 2 if you save the Rachni Queen in one, she has an Asari agent on Illium.
Both the Asari agent and the message she gives Shepard saying that he is hunting those who corrupted her kind during the Rachni Wars, pointing to the Reapers.
Considering the timeframe, I likely believe it was Sovereign who was messing with them.
Odds are the Geth were option 3, after option 1, the Keepers the option 2, the Rachni failed
@@UNSCPILOT Didn't the Geth event happen 300ish years before the games, while the Rachni Wars were more than 1500 years previous?
@@lookoutlegolas Reapers can wait and work on long timescales, 1500 years is nothing when you regularly wait 50,000.
Also the events with the Reapers contacting the Geth would have been extremely recent as Saren was used as the point of contact and he only contacted Sovereign in the last few years
@@UNSCPILOT I misunderstood your comment. I thought you were positing that the Geth were responsible for the Rachni Wars.
@@lookoutlegolas ah, yeah, no worries, Mass Effect has some fun lore so any excuse to talk about it more is great XD
I always assumed it was Sovereign, who was present for this cycle. It's possible he started the Rachni Wars to speed up the cycle within the time frame he needed.
That's what I always felt Vigil was suggesting when he said Sovereign had likely been working for centuries.
I like this theory. Maybe it wanted more races to become advanced enough for the Harvest when the rest of the Reapers arive.
I thought this was explicitly stated
Yes, as previous comments state, it is inferred that Sovereign has been working gathering "allies" to prepare for the next harvesting. I wouldn't be surprised if it even involved controlling politicians or even the economy for a major plan, but as always his actions where always indirect like controlling people like Saren.
Though because it involved full scale war it is hard to say if this was Sovereign's doing, but given the way Rachni communicate maybe it was easier to control them even at greater distances and sized a valuable asset.
Another point to consider is that a trigger for the harvest is not the amount of time it passed between cycles, but whether the civilizations where ready for the harvesting. Uniting them against a common foe would speed up the process in which the civilizations unite, communicate and expand, advancing cooperation and technology; requirements ideal for the harvest.
In another note:
It is very unlikely the Leviathan enthralled the Rachni, because if they where preparing them for the Reapers, they wouldn't pitch them against other civilizations centuries earlier just to risk big casualties. On the other hand if your objective is to get rid of a treat then again the Sovereign is the most likely culprit, as it gets rid of a major treat like the Rachni and weakens the other civilizations.
But then they wouldn't be able to create a new reaper.
Isn't there a lore piece explaining why they can't turn the Rachni into Reapers?
It sucks that saving the rachni does nothing differnet in ME3 except a few assets.
It’s better than killing them
You can say the same thing about most things in the series.
At the same time, I understand not being able to fit everything like that into one final game with 2011 technology.
@@blackdemonknight I agree, it's just from a gameplay standpoint, there's no difference. Not even something like Grunts Team never has to fight Rachni. It's filled with "The reapers found rachni DNA and made their own queen" but it's like...why? I know reapers indoctrinate to make ease of the reset, but seems like a lot of effort to regrow a species to kill it. Kinda goes against what they're about.
@@Jagrofes The Galaxy Expanded mod added some additional important but useless choices that would influence a particular outcome in Mass Effect 3. e.g. the Cerberus encrypted data you acquired in a Mass Effect 2 side mission (and if you chose to not give it to Cerberus but keep it for yourself or give to the Alliance) allows you to acquire a side mission in Mass Effect 3 where you raid a Cerberus space station (not the HQ though)
Well, don't many of seemingly important choices made in ME and ME2 only translate into assets in ME3? It's a recurring pattern in the game.
Its weird to think that the Rachni almost went extinct no less than 4 times on record.
Once by the Protheans
Once at the end of the Rachni Wars
Once on Noveria in ME1
Once in ME3 depending on if you let the Queen go in Noveria
And 5 if you go with Destroy since in ME3, spoilers.
The Rachni queen and her underlings are synthetic after the reapers changed them.
They were extinct .. but they were brought back by scientists. Of course all the scientist were killed and the rachni escaped. The krogans were called for population control , and did their job a bit too good.
@@ideadlift20kg83 Incorrect. The Queen herself is just shackled by reaper tech and only her children were changed. When the Crucible went off they were fine.
Makes the most sense that the rachni were influenced by the reapers. The queen is honest with you literally the whole time you know her in all games and her actions prove that in 3.
Every time I played, I chose to save the Rachni because they basically only attacked in the past when they were Mind controlled, and I feel sorry for them.
I felt bad for the Queen being a prisoner, forced to lay eggs, only to have her children taken away from her.
She was also the first Rachni we meet that didn’t try to kill us. She “spoke” and begged for help.
@@fumarc4501 Yes, I understand you, I feel sorry for her too, In fact, she did nothing wrong on Noveria, but then Benezia came, and the Rachni children were made enemies.
There isn't any proof they were being mind controlled tho.
Least none that makes sense
@@RogueWill83 perhaps not a direct proof, but time and again she mentioned how their "song was tampered/corrupted", and that caused them to become agressive, and considering that we find out that the reapers can affect "mind control/indoctrination" it could have affected them since they werent aware that something could get in the way of their song.
but again, like you said, no evidence other than her words/memory
The story about the Rachni was one of the most exciting, when I played ME for the first time.
The hints you get throughout all three games, is that they didn't go FUBAR by themselfs, but they were mindcontrolled to do so. But the fact that it's never answered makes this so interesting.
I really like the lore around them, and I hope we learn more about them in the future, maybe even get them as allies or enemies...
Also, REALLY like the caption-cards in this video. Cool designs and sounds :)
The Rachni were probably getting used the same way as the Geth, until they failed and Soveren had to start over
A chance to meet the old enemy? Impossible to resist!
Heh heh heh.
Do we know when Sovereign first tried (and failed) to open the Citadel Mass Relay? It very well could be that it took him 2100+ years to find a "successful" way (i.e. Saren). Maybe the Rachni was his first attempt (i.e. reaper harvesting by proxy) but that ultimately failed?
I don't think he was trying to harvest by proxy, but I'm darn sure he would have used it to open the relays to darkspace for the Reapers to get the cycle underway.
Organic puppets were too unreliable to use for one Reaper, so he went with the Geth instead.
I like this idea but I would add that maybe the rachni were going to replace the keepers
Rachni always reminded me of the Formic from Enders Game.
The whole war was just a fundamental misunderstanding. And so i always saved them. Potential Reaper involvment just further reinforces my choice.
I’m so glad that somebody else was able to make that connection. I had remembered reading Enders Game from school and how I’d gotten really into it, and the connection just seemed so right.
Also the leviathan theory makes the most sense. Wouldn't be hard to indoctrinate a ship crew and have them launch long range probes carrying artifacts onto rachni controlled planets
This is the way.
Except the scanner you use to find leviathan finds no link between Rachni ship movements and the leviathan.
And the rachni queen compares the memories with what happened to her people the "drowing of the song by the sour yellow note" to indoctrination.
Third the devices the leviathans use require close proximity to the subjects, it would be difficult to maintain control over an entire armies and fleets unless these were being carried by said armies and fleets, and if that was the case the council races would have likely found them after winning a battle, which would have significantly increased the risk that the leviathans might be discovered by the council races, and through them by the reapers, and we all know how protective the leviathans are about the secrecy of their continued existence.
Basically such a plans seems too big a risk for the leviathans to take.
Indoctrination however is a lot more subtle and doesn't require the constant close proximity of the indoctrinated after initial exposure.
Fourth if the Leviathan were preparing the rachni for war against the reapers then why would they launch them on a all out war on the Council races? What would that accomplish? Wouldn't it make more sense to keep said forces hidden and growing instead of exposing them and weakening them in a destructive war, especially since the leviathans know that the reapers are watching and would know if a race had grown powerful enough to defy them.
It makes more sense to me that it was sovereign that had indoctrinated the rachni because it wanted to reactivate the Citadel relay.
Vigil implied that the cycle was already very late, so indoctrinating the rachni could have been Sovereign's plan at the time to gain access to the Citadel by having them conquer the Citadel and weakening the Council races has a bonus, and all while keeping its existence hidden.
I think it makes more sense that the war was a by product of the protheans failed indoctrination
Leviathan probably have more proxies and catspaws than we think. They are masters of staying out of sight, after all.
@@furonbrainiac6634 I agree with you. It was more than likely Sovereign. If the cycle had happened like it should of the game would of been very different as Humanity would of been the dominant spacefaring race, seeing as the cycle should have “reset” about the time of the Rachni wars. Makes me think Sovereign was trying to artificially restart the cycle though the Rachni to keep itself hidden until the rest of the reapers showed up. When that failed, it tried a different tactic in using Saren and the Geth.
Come to think of it, the Rachni aren’t so different from the Keepers on the Citadel. Both are a hive mind insectoid race. Could be why Sovereign chose to use them.
I think the reason for the Rachni Wars is left nebulous by design. The galaxy is bigger than the Reaper conflict. 50,000 year cycles are long and varied. I prefer not knowing. It saves it from being over-explained, like the Reapers were by the Starchild.
Agreed. The reapers aren’t as terrifying when you know everything about them and where they come from, their motive, etc. That extra level of mystery adds so much to the horror of an antagonist
Exactly, especially when the explanation makes the antagonist very much less intelligent than expected. It makes the Reapers less advanced as true AIs than the Geth despite their vastly superior technology. The Geth thought to find a purpose outside their initial programming while the Reapers and their "AI", aka the Starchild, are still doing what their creators made them for and haven't deviated from it in the millions years of their existence. They're just tools, while the Geth are actual free thinking AIs.
The Starchild is an AI.
Ask yourself a question why would an AI only tell the truth? A lie is a logical choice when you want to convince someone and he has no way to fact check what you're saying. Especially since AI have no concept of morals.
Any number of things said by The Starchild may be a lie.
@@kathleendelcourt8136 The reapers became more advanced in their bodies, and tools, their tech, but remained too focused on the original goal the Leviathans designed them for. Those poor leviathans made the dumbest mistake in their hubris- asking an AI to solve a major problem without being VERY specific in what counts as an acceptable solution.
@@zeehero7280 aka Paperclip Maximizers
“Oily shadows” being Leviathan also makes sense because doesn’t the queen refer to the “maddening sour yellow note” of the machines? The Leviathan artifacts look like oil slicks. And the people enthralled by Leviathan all say it’s dark and cold.
Oily shadows gets related to indoctrination from reapers as well though, ie TIM using his indoctrination (reaper) tech to hijack you & Anderson during the end of the game
That’s a good name
I approve
Reapers inherited their indoctrination technique from their creators, didn't they?
@@voidseeker4394 sort of the Reaper’s indoctrination is more advanced and refined than the Leviathan’s natural ability, the Leviathan’s require their orbs over long distances or to be physically present (and even then when you directly encounter them there are orbs littering the level) and if the orbs are shielded or destroyed it instantly severs the connection, Reapers can indoctrinate you if you’re within their range to hear the “signal” or if you encounter pretty much any Reaper artifact, or even spending time near a dead Reaper, but once they’ve indoctrinated you they can control you from a distance as it actual rewires your brain, the caveat is if they want you to retain your intelligence they have to do it over time like the Leviathans (who need you to be near their artifacts over time but seemingly can assume direct control of you once the exposure reaches its threshold and return you to normal when they don’t need you anymore, so Leviathan’s is better for the victims in that their’s doesn’t seem to have serious long term damage unless they choose to damage you, but the Reapers can do irreversible damage to you that only a significantly strong-willed individual (Saren, TIM, Shepard, likely Anderson as we see him struggling as well when TIM is trying to control him and Shep) but even then it’s typically extremely difficult, the former two examples could only manage to off themselves so that the Reapers couldn’t reestablish control of them, and as we see with normal victims they become extremely paranoid and pretty much aren’t recoverable like Leviathan’s victims, also when the Leviathan’s “speak” to Shepard we don’t see the oily shadows, but instead are in a cold dark place
I always figured they came across some old Reaper artifacts that drove them loopy. There's several times it happens in ME1 alone so, I thought it might be the same here.
or dead reaper. remember the logs of cerberus scientists killed on dead reaper, when you meet legion of first time; even in death, reaper exert influence on people working there. i dont think rachnis were any more strong willed than humans...
0:53 This mission is fun on Insanity mode
1:25 This mission is not
On the OG or the LE?
The OP probably meant the parts of same mission, which I agree with them.
I always felt like the Rachni were just an adaptation of the formics. And as such were meant to be inscrutable and ultimately sympathetic in a way
Alien minds, but not evil. Just different and hard to understand one another.
@@fumarc4501 precisely. And what reason would a eusocial species have to grasp the concept of an individual life having much value ... It would be as alien to them as a hive mind is to us
I think they were inspired by the buggers in Enders game. Psychic hive mind bugs that fought a war they didn't want. Main character finds a sole survivor queen who wants to make amends
@@XD3blaze yes. The formics
I was not aware of the ending that leads to the Rachni to colonize Tuchanka. Poetic irony.
That being said, I’d never allow any species to go extinct on my watch. Not even the Reapers… there’s always another way.
I noticed the image displaying the Krogan skeletons only appears in the Destroy ending along with the Rachni taking over.
In Control however, while the Rachni still take over, there is no image depicting skeletons. I think this implies the Krogans only go extinct if they don't receive support from the rest of the galaxy due to the relays being destroyed. Which means it's possible both species are instead forced to share the planet.
Regarding he whole not extinguishing the Reapers... I can't argue I suppose, because I have the same opinion. But I'll still take that emotion shard from Javik when I'm integrated into them. It is my belief the shard goes with us, and I want to believe said shard is the true key to defeat the Reapers from the inside out without further sacrifice.
How would the Rachni Wars play out if Humanity played a part in it and the Krogan Rebellions?
I like Dr. Byson's Theory about the Lavathans' mind controlling the Rachni. Wish he left his theorys on notepads or something.
We are going in with the first wave of Krogan. Means more bugs for us to kill. You smash the entire area; you kill anything with more than two legs. You get me?!
Humanity would probably serve as vehicle crews and pilots, or other support staff, since that would free up more Krogan for frontline infantry. That and smaller beings need smaller vehicles, and smaller vehicles is good when in atmosphere.
Personally, I thought it was the Sovereign as an individual reaper who corrupted the Rachni. My impression was the reapers always leave 1of their own behind (Sovereign in this case) to monitor the evolution of the universe and signal 'the reaping'. While waiting Sovereign decided to corrupt the Rachni and pit them against rest of the races to weaken them. Just my 2 cents
Agreed. Also there was also the Leviathan.
It's possible that the Sovereign corrupted the Rachni - and then the Leviathan understood that and pitted the Council Races at the Rachni in return.
So the Rachni Wars could be in fact a proxy war between the Reapers and the Leviathan.
it was. They literally tell you that their song was corrupted.
I always thought it was implicitly clear that Sovereign, as part of its quest to unlock the Citadel relay, manipulated the Rachni to try to destroy the council
The Reapers aren't stupid. They have an objective, which is reduce organic life to elemental levels. Inspiring wars between species thins out the organics and makes their eventual incursion that much easier.
Sovereign may have noticed that the races of this cycle could prove particularly difficult to harvest, so it decided to tip the odds in the reapers' favour
I am more into theory that Rachni was aggressive because of Protheans. Javik says that they had to destroys many worlds to get rid of them. So in my opinion this is how it came out:
1. Protheans finds Rachni and makes decision that they will be perfect troops.
2. Rachni turns against Protheans but thanks to quickly learning of reverse technology they manage to develop structures, and star ships
3. Protheans somehow wins war with Rachni retreat to their home system.
4. Protheans manage to turn off the mass relay to Rachni system.
5. Rachni with another contact from Salarians are likely expecting someone who is in order of Protheans or just are too scared and fight back.
In short case Protheans were making from Rachni their Krogans like Salarians. It would be suited to thing that in universe with mass relays history always makes a loop. Like in this conversation between Javic and Garrus in ME3. Protheans were able to turn off Citadel relay connected with relay for Reapers in dark space, and they created their own little relay which connected Ilos with Citadel. They could turn off relay to Rachni home system. Rachni could not turn it on again because they were training to battle not to science and they did not have knowledge how turn off/on relays when they were fighting Protheans. All relays they needed were already open. Humans could open relay because they had this knowledge from archives on Mars. Rachni came back to developing ftl drives and so on but by all this time did not get information how to use mass relay technology until Salarians came in to system.
The most unexpected plot twist of all Mass Effect - there's a war without ancient mind controlling aliens pulling the strings.
Krogan rebellions
Morning war
First contact war
It would be cool to have mass effect game related in prequel events like first contact war
@@Ale-dd3ek Plus all the minor wars that occurred outside Council Space on a semi-regular basis and only got a quick mention in codex entries.
The Turian Unification War
We've had several cases of people catching reaper indoctrination through messing with artifacts, so I wouldn't be surprised if the Rachni had caused their own downfall by messing with some found artifacts, be they of Reaper, Leviathan or Promethean origin, or something we haven't heard of yet.
Sovereign being behind racni wars makes the most sense to me. Sovereign was left behind as a scout for the reapers to keep an eye on the galaxy and activate the citadel relay at the appropriate time, which it couldn't do because of the prothean sabotage. I think some time before 1st contact with the rachi Sovereign tried to activate the relay and couldn't then after it saw the rachni it saw an opportunity to seize control of the citadel with them being very easily indoctrinated hence why all of a sudden they went on a warpath with the council. But why didn't have reaper tech benson might ask, simple Sovereign didn't want to show its whole hand. This wasn't like in me1 where it had an indoctrinated agent on the inside and a lead on a back door into the citadel as well as an army under its control, if it revealed itself that could've gotten the council fleet to hunt it down and it wasn't stupid it knew even though it was substantially more powerful it wouldn't be able to take their whole fleet on. I have a feeling if the rachni had gotten a lot closer to capturing the citadel some reaper tech would've started showing up for the final push but the krogan happened instead. I also just don't think it makes any sense for the leviathan to do that, i mean they knew the reapers were watching and that's a hell of way for them to draw attention to themselves. If it was leviathan that indoctrinated them it would've made much more sense to train up the rachni and build a massive army to fight the reapers in secret instead of launching a massive galactic war that would just leave both sides in a weaker state if the reapers were to show up. But i guess we'll never know for sure unless bioware decides to clarify, so all theories are equally valid.
There is a lot of free real estate up for grabs in the former Batarian Hegemony. Perhaps the Rachni will find themselves a new home world somewhere there.
I'm glad you still find ways to make mass effect videos.
I'm sure (or just hoping) Leviathans will become the new antagonist race in ME4. There's just no other real enemy to compare to the Reapers.
The Queen in ME3 claimed that the Reapers cannot control her (they had to put her on a chain, quite literally), but Leviathans might have a different or more efficient indoctrination method, so even the Rachni could not resist it.
Could ME4 use a ME3 save import? Can the Queen become a problem if (when) Leviathans start a new war? Will saving the Queen AND sabotaging the cure become the worst possible scenario for ME4?
There devices where the black orbs that could just land and start indoctrinating folk, though the rules havent been explianed, bjt if that mining site anything to go by just haveing one will convert folk.
I just wanted a race of singing bugs to owe me a life debt. And who knows whether I'd have a dawn-on-the-third-day charge to save the galaxy with an army of Rachni at my back?
11:45 wow! I wonder how many people ever saw this ! It’s an extremely uncommon combination
Long live the Rachni. PS: Your ‘songs’ are always sweet and harmonious BigDan.
Listen to yourself! You're indoctrinated!
Ya know the krogan are built different when just one introduction of them in the rachni war made the council races starting to win
I hope they never give us a clear answer on this. For the reason that it makes trusting the Rachni a big risk in the long run. Sure this queen could be different but could she fall like the ones who came before her?
There is a fourth option, a certain mind controlling plant hivemind
It should also be noted that 1. As demonstrated by sovereign sleeper reapers are a thing, and 2. Canonically the reaper invasion was delayed due to the Protheans tampering with the keepers
So hypothetically there could have been an earlier attempt by the reapers
I like that there’s so many mysteries like this in Mass Effect. Makes the universe feel a lot larger
Don't know if anyone will see this but I'm confident that the Reapers caused the Rachni War. Bryson's line about the Reapers not being active is kinda bs in my opinion. We know Sovereign was still active but Bryson likely wouldn't know. And even without Sovereign it's possible that other dead Reapers like the Leviathan of Dis or the ME2 Derelict Reaper could've wound up in Rachni space.
Even without a dead Reaper, we know Reaper artifacts can still indoctrinate thanks to some of the ME1 side quests and the Firewalker Quest in 2. Why the Reapers would do it and why they wouldn't implement Reaper tech in the Rachni this early on makes a lot of sense to me. The Citadel Council was rapidly expanding through space around the time of the war. The war is what brought an end to the expansion and regulations on the relays that prevented anyone from using relays that lead into uncharted space due to the fear of encountering another species like the Rachni.
It's possible that the Reapers were afraid that if expansion like this was left unchecked then the progress needed to make advanced ai could happen early and needed to be stopped so they used the Rachni as a proxy. With how many cycles they've been through they could easily calculate that something like this could happen and how to respond. Why they didn't augment the Rachni with Reaper tech is as simple as they weren't ready to reveal themselves yet.
If the galaxy figured out that the Rachni weren't acting on their own, it could've spelt disaster for the Reapers plans when the cycle still had 1,000 years left. Imagine if the galaxy with species like the Quarians and Krogan at the height of their power, learned about the Reapers and had 1,000 years of prep time?
But that's just my take. I could be completely off in the end.
In the end, the theory that Sovereign caused the Rachni war is what I believe makes the most sense. There are several logical reasons for Sovereign to do this.
It may have been trying to force the galaxy to unify and have the apex species reach a suitable level of advancement to harvest.
Or maybe it was deemed the right time to invade, and the Rachni war was the first attempt at retaking the Citadel when the signal didn't work, which I think makes the most sense.
It gives us a very good reason as to why Sovereign went all out when it did. It had tried for 1000 years to get the harvest started. The apex species had advanced further in this time, and Humanity was a new factor. An aggressively advancing and expanding species that was quickly becoming a big piece of the galactic community. More potentially difficult enemies in a cycle that had already continued for 1000 years too long, and uncertainty as to whether or not Sovereign would be able to retake the Citadel.
It tried with the Rachni. It likely shifted to a more subtle approach when this failed. Eventually, conditions fall into the correct places. Sovereign has individual agents like Saren, who himself had powerful allies and pretty capable mercenaries working for him, and an army made up mostly of the Geth. This was likely the closest Sovereign had been to regaining control, and since it was 1000 years behind schedule, every second counted.
I dig the word splashes throughout the video!
Good job buddy!
I could listen to you talk Mass Effect lore all day long. Awesome video!
I don't believe the Leviathan theory. Speaking with the Leviathans makes it clear that they aren't interested in opposing the Reapers until meeting with Shepard, content to let the Reapers continue to try to solve the problem they set them to. They only interfere in things to hide their survival from the Reapers. I think it was Sovereign who set the Rachni to war. Sovereign could have decided the time was right to begin the Reaper invasion, and since the Citadel failed to respond, had to slowly set about indoctrinating the Rachni to go to war so there'd be a clear path to the Citadel. It probably would've worked if not for the Krogan, so Sovereign had to start over, building allies again over the centuries until it felt the time was right to strike.
To be fair, there could be more than one group of Leviathan hiding. The ones you meet are big on hiding, while another could be looking to settle scores. I've headcanon that the first Crucible designs were by a Leviathan group that got wiped out millions of years ago.
The leviathan didn't set the reapers on anything. The leviathan did not create the reapers. The catalyst created the reapers and set them to task, not the leviathans.
@@nunya_bizniz True, but my point remains the same. The Leviathans didn't want to interfere because they believed the Catalyst was still trying to come up with a solution to the problem.
This video is fire!
Loved this since iv'e been pondering a bit about this my self, and on the plus side, you got a very good "reporter voice" Dan
The conclusion I drew based on the game's information was this:
Sovereign and the reapers said that organics evolve based on the whim of the reapers as they all use reapers tech, making the eventual harvest easier i.e. the citadel and mass relays.
My theory is therefore that sovereign/the reapers indoctrinated the rachni early to weaken organics-they couldn't use them as allies in the reaper war and organic government is unstablised by a war. Considering the rachni war led to the tensions between the krogan and council races and caused the genophage which weakened the krogan I'd say this was a big win for the reapers. I know it may seem a stretch to say the reapers predicted all this but if their goal was to just to weaken organics then they succeeded even if they wouldn't know exactly how.
This is further backed by Javik who tells us things about the prothean cycle that mirror what happens in the current cycle such as synthetics turning on their creators. He also says that the proteins tried to subjugate the rachni so the reapers learning from their mistake would have two options for them: indoctrinate them like they do in 3 or wiping them out/making organics hostile towards them.
I hope this makes sense.
Great video, loving the Mass Effect content
Great deep dive into Mass Effect history/lore, I'm pretty sure I've watched some of your videos before but you got my sub because this made me really want to jump back in and play all the ME games again. Keep doing what you're doing!
It was probably sovereign trying to use the rachni to take the citadel since it didn’t respond to his signal anymore
The Rachni are my favourite race in Mass Effect. It would have been great to have had a Rachni crew member.
My personal theory was the Rachni war was Sovereign or Harbinger's attempt to gain control of the Citadel as a response to the Reapers figuring out the Prothians from Ilos had successfully tampered with the Citadel recalling the Reapers normally, extending the current cycle.
That if the cycles had gone to plan, Humans would have been one of if not the first advanced race for the cycle after the current.
I think after the Rachni left their space once getting FTL they could've found the Leviathan pearls
I love that mass effect discourse is alive and well. Can't wait for N7!
This is weird! I literally started playing Mass effect last week and your videos popped up lol. Appreciate your videos and channel sonfar
Love the title 😎 Great video as always Big Dan!
Great video nicely researched!
It’s a very interesting theory as to what happened to the Rachni, the Mass Effect Trilogy didn’t really clearly explain their origin to well, all we had were possible theories of who was actually controlling them, we don’t even get any sort of explanation in Mass Effect: Andromeda, so we might see something about them in the next Mass Effect sequel.
I guess the artifact could have been on the ship that had first contact with the Rachni. Then the artifact indoctrinated the Rachni. After the indoctrination of the Rachni, they explored the galaxy while being used as scouts or resource gathers for the leviathan.
Sovereign was trying to make an army to get to the citadel to open the big relay to darkspace, like what he later did with the geth. Taking opportunities as they came, to try and speed up the invasion. Worried that if the galaxy was left alone too long, they might become too advanced.
Given that the rachni were present during the previous cycle but left untouched by the reapers like the asari I still think it was Sovereign/the reapers because they would of identified them for a future purpose during that cycle. I think they were then indoctrinated and shaped for the purpose of destabilising the galaxy ahead of the reapers' arrival, because we know they were originally supposed to arrive earlier but were delayed because of the prothean sabotage
Dan, this is my favorite kind of video 💛 Amazing work and research into this one.
I saved the Rachni in one play-though only to be told they wouldn't show up to the final battle. Seems the mind-control was just part of the problem, they were still 'bad-eggs' without it.
Rationalizing to save her all depends on the BIG IF they were mind controlled. Which,even if they were
1- Does not excuse/erase all the damge they caused
2- Being mind controlled for more than 1,000 years is a huge liability
3- Does not mean they wont be a threat later on, which spoiler, they are later on
Think of all the other characters we know for sure were indoctrinated like Saren and Illusive man, did we forgive them because they were mind controlled? Did that erase all the past crimes? NO, we either put a bullet in them or those characters offed themselves, not one mind controlled character turned good and fought on our side
So why would we players assume a race that has been mind controlled for more than 1,000 years would have a change of heart or not fall to it again 😂. Keep the same energy, all those other characters had to go, so too do the Rachni.
I think it's a reaper thing. They have been putting their plans in motion for years and perhaps they were laying a groundwork for post citadel trap
A lot can happen to a species in three drahn, like turning green and evil.
I mean, if Protheans attempted to use Rachni as shock troopers then... maybe that's why they had to nuke them? Because after they got deployed to hundreds of worlds, Reapers pulled a sneaky on them and Rachni "rebelled".
After all there'd be nothing in for Leviatahans in sabotaging Protheans war efforts against Reapers.
Perhaps a scout ship of the Reapers, like Harbinger? He was able to convert Saren
I always saved he Rachni, BUT…I also realized the risk that because they were easily controlled by the reapers in the past they could easily be turned again.
Dan if you look at the fleet move movements it hints at two groups beside the main Rachi forces at the time of the Rachi Wars. One group hunting for the Mu Relay and the other was moving near to the planet that Leviathan was on. What if the truth was more along the lines of they got pissed that the Salarian landed on one of the Rachi worlds and took a few Rachi's to a STG base to run test (wouldn't be the first intelligent species that the Salarian's did that to) which kicked off the war (Javik said that the Prothean only let the war like Rachi live to use them as weapons) but you also had two groups after the war started fall under control of the Leviathan and Sovereign (could explain the sour oily notes the Rachi Queen was talking about). For the Leviathan group a Queen could have found one of the orbs that's how Leviathan took control of them. And for Sovereign he could have landed on a freshly conquered world and indoctrinated a group to help find out why the citadel wasn't responding to the signal to open (as vigil hinted at). But this is my theory on how the Rachi Wars started and why the Rachi looked to be looking for something in the war.
Makes sence to me "oily song" would be how id see big calamari talking in your mind lol.
I always save the Rachni. They literally go to the Citadel as promised and actively work towards peace. Like she’s always promised. And obviously things won’t be perfect, but they’ll drastically improve.
A potential alternative idea is one to which Javik alludes to. The Rachni as a whole were inclined towards being peaceful, and one of the methods by which the Protheans engineered an army out of them was via breeding the more warlike queens whilst eliminating others.
It’s highly probable then that by the time of the current cycle, only warlike rachni remained, leaving the more peaceful queens to be the minority.
If this is the case, the songs the current Queen describes could simply be the memory of the warlike Queens, whose nature would have been generally alien to the Queen we know, who I think we can reasonably understand to be of peaceful intent.
Protheans breed the rachii to be war like as mentioned by Javik. So I think even without the Reapers intervention they were still insidious
Very well explained,
Mass Effect has been out for over a decade, and I'm just now putting something together with this video. There are many similarities with the insect-like race from 'Enders Game'. My brain hurts now.
1: I think perhaps your description of their discovery of Element 0 could also mean that that's where they found artifacts. Artifacts would not have had to have been planted on their home world. Just somewhere where they were likely to find them. Being hive-society, these would be brought to the Queens. Thus, that's how Leviathan could have indoctrinated them.
2: Note that first contact between humans and saurians also resulted in a "First Contact War". I suspect that the war was at first a misunderstanding, but got escalated, if indoctrination wasn't at play. History repeats itself. See also Shepherd's possible comment to Alvina when discussing the Krogan statue. "You needed the Krogans to handle the Rachni, then the Turians to handle the Korgan... Who will handle the Turians?"
3: The wiki makes a better clear case of the timeline. The Rachni were modified during the height of the Prothean era, to make them more warlike. Those who survived on Suen were likely not the original species.
Im surprised you glanced over Sovereign, because as far as i can remember, the citadel was meant to be activated much sooner for the reapers to go about their harvest.
So i wouldnt be surprised if Sovereign actually controlled the Rachni to try and take over the Citadel without showing himself
Imagine if the Rachni were recruitable for ME3 final assault… crazy how many different outcomes the game could’ve had.
rachni+ cured krogans? reapers would be wiped out in few years :P . even running back in dark space wouldnt save them. not sure if letting krogans run around unchecked would be wise decision. maybe it would as long as wrex and Eve are holding the highest ranks :) .
Well as far as we know, the collectors were operating on the reapers behalf and were in contact with active reapers.
Perhaps the collectors acting as a proxy for the reapers had a hand in what happened with the rachni.
Ou cool video. I love that rachni song on moon too 😁 could you possibly do a video on mass effect 1 collections like league one? I could not find any detailed videos on that matter and i wanna know some lore about them please 😁
i'll throw in my two cents as well. if you read the comics you'll come across the illusive man's backstory. in it you see a reaper artifact seeded on a world that effectively transforms and indoctrinates creatures that come into contact with them. add to this that the rachni were an already moderately advanced species as evidenced by their rebellion against the protheans, and i can see the possibility that the reapers planted such devices near worlds that threatened to grow faster than would be ideal for the cycle. as for why they would attack without question, i figure that the artifact infected a group of queens. the directly infected seem to lose a considerable amount of their mental capabilities and become highly aggressive, with the primary objective of their lives becoming the defense of the artifact. as such i can see the queens remaining to defend the artifact while they send out the troops through the hive mind. hell, we may be have only encountered the rachni immediately after a civil war between the reaper indocrtinated faction and the otherwise normal rachni. which would make our remaining queen the clark kent of the rachni... what a fun thought.
8:57 “What do you think Edi?”
KFC Ad: “I don’t care…”
🙇🏻♂️
Honestly, Sovereign could have easily been active before the Rachni wars. He would have woken up from time to time to survey the Galaxy.
A test run of his systems and tactical planning would be needed as a "check-up", of sorts. The resulting war could have been nothing more, than Sovereign he was ready to kick off doomsday when time was up.
Alternatively. The Rachni were a part of the survey. Sovereign could have been testing the Galaxy's defenses, resolve and morale in times of war. It's likely Sovereign would have seen the Rachni as a catalyst for speeding up the Galactic cycle's progress.
Nothing like a potential extinction level event, to put pressure on the advanced races to evolve down the path, Sovereign desired.
Its crazy cause in my game the rachni at the end of 3 even though i spared her twice she ends up being a sleeper agent for the reapers and kill alot if people
I fought it was a somewhat of a coup by miltant faction. Queens seems to be independent. So if this militant faction was able to tweek the overall "tune" of Rachni civilization, I think it would be pretty hard to change back.
The reapers were originally going to replace the keepers with modified rachni
I honestly didn't know they colonise the Krogan world if you choose the "right" decision 😅
The Leviathans didn't create the Reapers, they created the Catalyst, which in turn created the Reapers after coming to the conclusion that all organics create synthetics to make them subservient, only for the synthetics to rebel and either destroy their masters or be destroyed themselves.
My though was that when Sovereign sent the signal to the keepers and they didn't open the citadel mass effect, it used the Rachi to probe the galaxy and possibly try to take the citadel. When that didn't work, it spent more time planning and observing until it rushed its plans in mass effect one in a desperate attempt to bring back the reapers.
4:21 one of grunt’s most heroic moments 😢😢❤️
remember vigil said sovreign was probably planning to open the citadel relay long before the events of the first game
I think since the Rachni react to a queen, It would be possible for Leviathans to control those limited individuals and thus the Rachni. But I also think the Rachni are too alien and thus a war was always going to happen.
The real story is that the Rachni are absolutely "Buggers" from Ender's Game with a few details shifted around :D
I’m more inclined to believe that it was the Reapers. Bryson comes across as a conspiracy nut who lucked into a story anchored in the truth. Even then he doesn’t appear to have known what Leviathan was.
I always figured the Queen either did not know why the others went to war or she lied to save her skin as they are a hive mind she would have been connected to the adult queens during the war. It's all fishy as can be and given how poorly they did against the reapers in the third game I'd have to say they were not groomed to be an anti-reaper army. I honestly think the big bug was saying whatever she had to in order to survive and would do what she needed to be allowed to escape.
Even so, she had not been born yet, so she couldn't take action. Perhaps her opinions were contrary to the war but she was unable to reach out to her mother.
I hope there is a medium size side quest of you helping the Rachni in the next game.
It has been a while since I watched one of your videos and your voice sounds very different.
I believe in the Reaper theory because of the hints that first the rachni are the base vor the keepers on the citadel and the comment some were in ME that the rachni were something of a final test of the Reapers for every ciecle to conclude if they had reach their full potential and the stage at which the Reapers were to engage them.
My head Canon always was that if the Rachni were the most susceptible to indoctrination that saving them would be key to coming up with a counter measure for it. Thinking long term they were the ones with the most motivation to counter it. I always figured rapid advancement was the key to beating the reapers.
I believe the Rachni war was engineered by either Reapers, or the Leviathans. Reapers might have seen them as an extreme threat if left alone for too long, so they pitted them against other galactic species in an attempt to prevent that. Leviathans might have also seen Rachni as extreme threat to the Reapers, so they attempted to fill the galaxy with them, as they made far better use of the resources in the galaxy than other species. Apparently noone expected Krogans to eradicate them so utterly.
If the rachni homeworld has underground water systems then it’s not too much of a stretch to think Leviathan may have lived there too
It would be so cool if next time we could play as a krogan that fought in both the rachni wars and krogan rebellions. Sounds like a way more interesting story that we will never hear in detail.
I enjoy your videos and the depth of them. This was a good one too so you earned a subscriber.
I do have a question on Andromeda and would like your input if possible. I'll leave it on the "Trash Effect Blandromeda" video and a response would certainly be appreciated! Thanks!
Such a very fascinating alien race! Hope they do return in the next Mass Effect.
You're videos break down the best part of video games. 💯