Star wars versus Mass Effect

[Fabula Caromed]

Honestly, if you're getting hit by either side, you're going to die. Jedi lightsabers obliterate everything they touch, no matter how good ME armor is. Likewise, SW just cannot grasp the idea of armor. Both are going to die horribly, and in huge numbers.

 

[Ayden Cater]

@[member="Tracyn Ordo"]

So I did some math. Alliance ships are started to be capable of traveling at roughly fifty times the speed of light (14,989,622,900 meters per second). Now that sounds impressive, but a light year is 9,460,730,472,580,800 meters. The astute will notice that's around two orders of magnitude more than what the Alliance can travel. So dividing those two numbers yields 631,152, which is the number of seconds it would take to travel one light year at that speed. A more palpable number would be 175 hours, or about seven days.

In seven days, a Star Wars ship could navigate from almost any one end of the galaxy to the other other and back with time to spare.

This is why the ME galaxy relies so heavily on the Mass Relays. They can do "local" space travel fine, but they can't go long distances at any appreciable speed without a Mass Relay.

FTL: Edge; Star Wars.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Don't want to quote entire post. Feel obligated to quote entire post. Hnnr.

The FTL fight goes to SW. The small arms/space weapons fight goes to ME. The magic fight goes to SW. In direct confrontations, the ability to pull quasi-atomic levels of power for every single individual soldier and ship is incredible...but considering they're going to be outmaneuvered, ambushed, and pincered in every single space battle and there is no ME answer to Jedi, it still comes out at a vicious stalemate.

Unless we're taking into account the horrendously sheer gap in power between biotics and the Force. Which makes this whole argument quite silly.

 

[Siobhan Kerrigan]

@[member="Fabula Cavataio"]

So...Sio and Fabula against thresher maws? Bet they don't need to summon one on Tuchanka to kill that Reaper Destroyer. Take both on to make it fair!

 

[Judas]

Reavers are far more superior than any ship in the Star Wars Universe.

 

[Vereaux]

Reavers are far more superior than any ship in the Star Wars Universe.

^ This post, though it's Reapers, not Reavers xP

I love the debate, but I think we're not getting a solid frame of reference. What point in time for either universe? Up next is an ME3 ending spoiler, so you're warned.

Spoiler

I would personally choose the ending with all life in the galaxy becoming both organic and synthetic. Under this, you have the Reaper technology and their collective knowledge over hundreds of billions of years. This, I think, makes up for almost all technological disadvantages you might find with ME because once the two societies meet, they will either reverse engineer what they find, or make something superior within a few months of the war. FTL travel, yeah, SW has the advantage, but they won't for long afterward.

As for ship combat, ME has them beat with Reaper technology. In ME2, you come across soldiers talking about firing a missile with firepower three times the nuke that hit Hiroshima, and he was holding it in his hand. Reapers would use far more powerful weaponry, and their shield technology make it so that missiles like that don't even scratch it.

To comment now on the Force and Biotics, if we're looking at the SW canon, yes, the Force is powerful, but it is not the end all and be all of abilities. People have to train years atop of years to become good at what they do, but you find very few Force users in the whole canon history that can affect the galaxy on any planetary scale. The ones you do find are exceptional examples of their kind, and there might be less than a dozen such people like this. Force users are good, but they are not easy to train to be very good. Take Biotics: no, they aren't able to reach out like the Force, but Biotics are drastically more common and easier to train. Their existence is a fact across almost every society, where as Force users are almost exclusively the Jedi and Sith in large numbers. Mandalorians don't have them in large supply, the Empire doesn't have them in large supply, and if you look at everything else, you have scattered groups of users that all together might be half the size of either the Jedi or Sith.

Point I'm making is that there are pros and cons to both sides, but over the long term, ME would be far more organized as a whole to fight SW, where as SW would be hard pressed to fight together over anything.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Biotics are drastically more common

One species is biotic, and that species is the least populous out of all common species. Human and Turian biotics are incredibly rare. Force sensitives were only "exclusive" so far as we heard about them in the movies. The EU establishes a huge plethora of non-Jedi/Sith traditions that had hundreds of members in their numbers, which leaves the figures quite skewed towards SW once again, especially considering exactly how much more powerful the Force is than the psionic/mutant ability to alter mass with your mind.

SW wins in magic.

 

[Siobhan Kerrigan]

@[member="Fabula Cavataio"]

Now I want a non-canon plotline where Sio and Fabula get thrown into the Mass Effect universe. And...destroy so much.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Yeeeesh. And become sex icons on Tuchanka.

 

[Siobhan Kerrigan]

@[member="Fabula Cavataio"]!

Yes! So many breeding requests!

And henceforth the Asari shall abandon their Goddess and worship them.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

"Reapers? Ah yes, the apocalyptic alien machine race allegedly obliterated by two human girls with laser swords. We have dismissed this claim."

 

[Vereaux]

One species is biotic, and that species is the least populous out of all common species. Human and Turian biotics are incredibly rare. Force sensitives were only "exclusive" so far as we heard about them in the movies. The EU establishes a huge plethora of non-Jedi/Sith traditions that had hundreds of members in their numbers, which leaves the figures quite skewed towards SW once again, especially considering exactly how much more powerful the Force is than the psionic/mutant ability to alter mass with your mind.

SW wins in magic.

I don't doubt that the Force is much more versatile when it comes to what it can do, but there are some things Biotics can do better, and over the long run, the Force isn't going to last against them.

Biotic Barrier: Similar to a kinetic barrier, which is extremely common throughout the ME military forces, and the only equivalent in SW is Tutaminis, which is a rare ability to use when against blaster fire and lightsabers. Lightsabers can't stop a shot that is composed of both energy and material components, such as a pistol. Yes, they can melt it, but it's still a moving object that will pass through the lightsaber, now at that point a very hot metal. Both Biotic and Kinetic Barriers stop all manner of objects, with options to reenforce one protection over the other. Since SW focuses almost exclusively on particle technology with blasters, all ME has to do is protect mostly against blaster bolts when fighting long range.

Biotic Lift, Singularity, Throw, Warp, and too many others: Different applications of moving objects, so they aren't too much different from the classical Force Push and Pull, but their multitude of abilities by ME3 make them such that while you have better control with the Force, Biotics are more creative and destructive with it in close range combat. Over long range, the Force beats them hands down.

All that aside since the Force will beat them on an individual basis, what I'm pointing out is that in the long run, it doesn't matter if they do. According to the Star Wars Wiki, the galaxy holds upwards of 20 million sentient species. Honestly, I think it is more like 20 billion, because with an entire galaxy in a setting like this and with what's going on, you are definitely going to have more than that on just Coruscant alone in my opinion.

Now take Thessia, the home planet of the Asari: they have a population of over 5.5 billion by itself. Take into account the rest of the galaxy, we're looking at about 10 billion, just to be conservative. Let's say 10 percent don't develop their Biotic abilities; that leaves 9 billion that do. Every Asari studies in the military at some point for some length of time, an average of about 30 years, a very small span of time compared to hundreds of years, so all of them have at least the minimum training expected of them. Let's say that 1 billion are Asari Commandos, or we could lower that to as low as about 100 million.

Going under the information on the Star Wars Wiki, ME severely outnumbers SW population wise. If we say there are 20 billion instead in SW, ME still outnumbers because of the combined population over their entire galaxy. Biotics represent a good about 10 percent of their combined military. SW doesn't come close to having 10 percent, more likely to say 1 to 5 percent, if they send absolutely everyone.

The Force is awesome, but they're kinda screwed >.>

 

[Fabula Caromed]

The comparison of Asari Commando to Jedi/Sith is rather generous to an Asari Commando, considering they're the equivalent of a Jedi Knight without a lightsaber, the ability to see the future, heal wounds, affect the minds of others, or shoot lightning from their hands.

Biotic Lift, Singularity, Throw, Warp, and too many others: Different applications of moving objects, so they aren't too much different from the classical Force Push and Pull, but their multitude of abilities by ME3 make them such that while you have better control with the Force, Biotics are more creative and destructive with it in close range combat. Over long range, the Force beats them hands down.

The level of "control" that any given interpretation of a Force user has over their telekinesis is entirely dependent on the medium in which they're being expressed. In the movies, the Force is treated as a subtle thing, a mystical energy with mysterious power that encompasses everything and everyone, but we don't see that many physical manifestations of its potency. In SW video games, the effective power level is jacked up to or beyond what one would expect from a Mass Effect biotic.

Considering that Mass Effect is 100% video games, I think you can see the conclusion I'm drawing from this. Both series' psionic magic, when applied to video games, comes out to roughly the same level of "creativity" and "destruction," but biotics simply cannot match the sheer multitude of effects the Force can achieve. No precognition, no mending lethal wounds in the field, no opening dimensional vortexes to obliterate entire fleets, no frying a platoon with electric power.

Jedi/Sith battle abilities are admitted frequently to be very, very largely dependent on their ability to see the future, to feel their enemy's actions before the enemy even knows they're going to do them. It's subconscious, instinctual, and is what allows them to block projectiles with their lightsabers. A single Jedi is worth half a dozen Asari Commandos, at the least. And there are a lot more Jedi and Sith and Jensaarai and Zenison Sha and Matukai than there are Asari Commandos.

SW wins in magic. Hard.

 

[Other Space Kaiden]

(Short post from mobile)

Both universes have their advantages, but the shock factor of fighting each other would even the grounds quickly. If such a confrontation were to happen it would probably be unplanned and one side would accidentally discover the other. Assuming war broke out, FUs have to deal with fighting an enemy that almost exclusively uses weapons that pass through their sabers and have equal or greater power than blasters. Hundreds to thousands of FUs would die this way before they caught on. At the same time, ME soldiers haven't fought the extreme power of the force. It would also depend on where the war occurred. If it were in the ME universe they would have a great advantage over Star Wars and vice versa. In the end bot sides would lose so much i think itd be a draw.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

FUs have to deal with fighting an enemy that almost exclusively uses weapons that pass through their sabers

Material weapons don't pass through lightsabers. I don't know who started this myth. A projectile with less width than the lightsaber blade is evaporated entirely. A projectile with equal or greater width is cut in half on the blade. ME small arms projectiles are the size of peas or smaller. They'd vaporize on contact.

 

[Vereaux]

You're assuming that matter just disappears on contact with the blade. It doesn't. The blade, according to canon, is composed of plasma. It's implied that it is suspended in a field to contain it, allowing for example air to pass through. The way a lightsaber "cuts" something is by heating it up beyond its boiling point. With this, it can "cut" through almost all material like butter, but the material has to go somewhere. You usually encounter them just cutting through droids, doors, people, etc.; this is very much possible, but the material is still there, raised to their boiling point at the moment of contact. You can't just evaporate metal, it doesn't work like that. Unless Star Wars ignores a foundation of thermodynamics, the lightsaber will heat up the piece shot at them, but it will not stop its motion. ME weaponry fires shots at similar, if not superior, speeds to that of a bullet you can fire from say a .45 or something. Air resistance slows them down, yes, but it doesn't stop it. Plasma, a higher temperature state than that of a gas, cannot stop it either because it cannot produce enough friction. A lightsaber will be helpful, but it is next to useless in a firefight against anyone from ME.

As for the debate over the Force and Biotics, if Asari Commandos are the equivalent to Jedi Knights, just without lightsabers, Asari still out number them, because the largest group of the Jedi is the Jedi Knights. Jedi Masters take up the smallest size of the whole order and I don't see them going out in force together as a group to fight the Asari. They'll most likely lead groups of Jedi Knights by themselves, which may or may not give them an edge in some situations. I really don't think there are as many as a few billion Force users in the galaxy that could match up to the Asari. Force users are a minority in the galaxy, which actually saves it from itself because if we did have more than a few billion Jedi and Sith Knights, the galaxy as a whole would be f*cked because of the in fighting just by itself.

As for the difference between the movies and video games, that honestly becomes a difference in budget and graphics. The comics would be a better comparison between the two, I think. As for what the Force can do with its other abilities: precognition only goes so far or we wouldn't have fighting to begin with; Force Heal won't instantly heal wounds, but Medi-gel from ME doesn't either in my opinion, so it could go in either's favor, ME being the more likely since Medi-gel is common; and the only person who created dimensional vortexes was Sidious, and considering how he was, no one else can do it. As for the frying platoons with lightning, only thing I can say is that only the Sith would do it.

In essence, maybe the Force wins in that regard, but that is the only thing going for the Jedi in my opinion.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

As for the debate over the Force and Biotics, if Asari Commandos are the equivalent to Jedi Knights, just without lightsabers, Asari still out number them, because the largest group of the Jedi is the Jedi Knights. Jedi Masters take up the smallest size of the whole order and I don't see them going out in force together as a group to fight the Asari. They'll most likely lead groups of Jedi Knights by themselves, which may or may not give them an edge in some situations. I really don't think there are as many as a few billion Force users in the galaxy that could match up to the Asari. Force users are a minority in the galaxy, which actually saves it from itself because if we did have more than a few billion Jedi and Sith Knights, the galaxy as a whole would be f*cked because of the in fighting just by itself.

Not every Asari is a Commando. In fact, a very small number of them are, and they are the deadliest biotics in the ME galaxy. The fact that they're both of inferior stock compared to a Jedi and VASTLY outnumbered by the total number of Jedi, Sith, and affiliated programs in the galaxy is what hinges the bet. I'm doing all of this comparison on the idea that it is Jedi knights these ladies are fighting, not Masters or Sith Lords. God knows how many Asari Mace Windu could butcher before he broke a sweat.

You're assuming that matter just disappears on contact with the blade. It doesn't. The blade, according to canon, is composed of plasma. It's implied that it is suspended in a field to contain it, allowing for example air to pass through. The way a lightsaber "cuts" something is by heating it up beyond its boiling point. With this, it can "cut" through almost all material like butter, but the material has to go somewhere. You usually encounter them just cutting through droids, doors, people, etc.; this is very much possible, but the material is still there, raised to their boiling point at the moment of contact. You can't just evaporate metal, it doesn't work like that. Unless Star Wars ignores a foundation of thermodynamics, the lightsaber will heat up the piece shot at them, but it will not stop its motion. ME weaponry fires shots at similar, if not superior, speeds to that of a bullet you can fire from say a .45 or something. Air resistance slows them down, yes, but it doesn't stop it. Plasma, a higher temperature state than that of a gas, cannot stop it either because it cannot produce enough friction. A lightsaber will be helpful, but it is next to useless in a firefight against anyone from ME.

One-half the lightsaber's cutting power comes from the plasma. However, it's the containment field that gives it its ability to resist. The explicit mechanics of how a lightsaber burns through things are that matter pressing against the containment field of the blade causes INCREDIBLE amounts of friction, which results in the burning effect. This is why lightsabers can block slughthrowers; by cutting them, when they come into contact. The bullet is split in half at an angle behind the blade, or if it's small enough, pressed against the containment field through the entire course of touching the blade to begin with to being shunted aside...and thus evaporated. Lightsabers are fantasy weapons in a fantasy universe - of course they violate the laws of physics. By existing, they're already "solid light," which is so far removed from impossible as to be fantasy.

Convenient that, considering SW is a space fantasy.

Lightsabers can and have always been able to block slughthrowers. ME weapons are slughthrowers on steroids. Lightsabers can block ME weapons. Added to the sheer power gap between a Jedi and any answer a biotic could provide, this evens things out quite nicely on the ground front. As stated before, SW wins magic, ME wins weapons.

 

[Ayden Cater]

The core issue that Anna is touching on is that Star Wars is a space fantasy/soft sci-fi setting while Mass Effect is considerably more "hard" sci-fi in nature. Naturally, this means things are generously stretched or outright inflated within Star Wars for the sake of the story. Mass Effect, in comparison, has a large number of rules and guidelines that control who can do what and where. It takes this to produce a human biotic, weapons function in this manner to achieve this effect. In Star Wars, it's pretty much a free-for-all as far as rules and science are concerned. We have entire species whose whole sense of the galaxy is done through the Force. There are beings that defy all logic and reason and consider themselves banal. At the end of the day, Star Wars has a lot more elasticity and a much larger pool of EU material to fill its side of the fight with.

Also, if you want to try and bring in the Reapers, Star Wars could bring in Rakata or Celestials. Centerpoint Station, anyone?

The best outcome the ME 'verse could hope for is a bloody stalemate.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Let's not forget the Kwa, the Silentium, and a hundred other galactic superpowers that redefined civilizations and threatened the fate of the cosmos.

 

[Alan]

Another major advantage of the Mass Effect universe is the ability that the Reapers have is to simply reprogram the fallen enemy. That, and the fact that they are entirely one of the most disturbingly powerful machines and weapons that I can think of.