Tali's immune system - wait, what?

[pspman45]

who cares if it makes no sense, it makes a great story. it provides depth to her character

I care. It IS a great story, and a great relationship (I enjoyed Tali's relationship more than any other so far, including Garrus/FemShep). That said, it still bothers me.

Also, if it doesn't make sense, then that harms the realism of the story.

And finally, how does the specific biological nature of her issues "provide depth to her character" ? How she reacts to them, sure. The fact that she's willing to risk her life for a night with Shep is awesome. But couldn't the writers have taken five minutes to google allergic reactions and get it right? It actually makes a lot of sense (more sense than a weak immune system) but then she should be taking immuno-suppressants, not immune boosters.

I believe that one of the best levels is Tali's loyalty mission. the writing while aboard the geth controlled vessel has some of the best writing i've seen in years. I too was a bit skeptic about that and I understand what you are saying, but it all comes down to this: i don't think bioware has any bio-medical scientists on hand, especially ones who specialize in a fictional race of people in purple helmets. by asking questions like this, you are asking for Mass Effect to turn into Star Wars, who has waayyyy too much information on the fictional races, thus ruining the fun of strange looking aliens

 

[FirstPersonWinner]

Words of advice: "Don't Over Think Science-Fiction"

But if you want to get into it first off:
1-"What is true in humans doesn't have to be true in aliens"
2-"She said it was similar to an allergic reaction for explanatory purposes"

 

[Bara_no_Hime]

I'm going to say it's because no one at Bioware is an immunologist. But I feel your pain, all the medical nonsense about Quarians just didn't make any sense to me either. Why do they all wear their suits at all times on every ship where a sterile environment could be maintained? Or why haven't they slowly introduced diseases and such to improve their immune systems?

The Quarian ship thing is a little screwy too, I'll grant you. If the ships are clean, and that did whatever it did to their immune systems, then why are they in suits on their ships?

Other than because it makes them look cool and mysterious (which is, of course, the real reason).

Actually, I wonder if someone at Bioware didn't research it. Some of the lines of dialog threads make perfect sense... until you ask the next question. It was like one writer had information X and the other writer had information Y, and different dialog trees skip back and forth between the two writers and their conflicting information.

Either answer would make sense. Having both is just a mess - the two lines of reasoning are mutually exclusive.

 

[MetaMop]

Why does no one ever try to solve these problems with genetic engineering? Haven't humans conquered most diseases and boosted their constitution considerably?

Ah! A very good point. That one, though, I'm willing to concede them because "enviro-suited quarians are cool". Also, I'm not sure how many biology labs they have in the immigrant fleet. Maybe some far-thinking quarian needs to bring some of that back for their pilgrimage.

I get it. In the future, science will solve every problem that doesn't make for a cool plot element. There are plenty of faults in logic, such as the *SPOILERS* human experimentation on Tuchanka; Mordin says that humans make good test subjects because they have more varied reactions to stimuli, when in fact, this makes them bad test subjects because you want to narrow down variables, not make new ones that wouldn't be present in the species you're intending to treat. *END SPOILERS*

 

[The3rdEye]

Words of advice: "Don't Over Think Science-Fiction"

Pretty much.

 

[ryo02]

dont Quarian immune systems tend to adapt to infections rather than fight them off?.

who knows maybe Quarian immune systems tend to break down infections on a genetic level essentially removing the probleme of different chirality? thus preventing an allergic reaction.

Ive no idea what Im talking about.

 

[Daverson]

Bear in mind this is the universe where the "dilithium crystals" is called "Element Zero", anyone with even a basic understanding of chemistry will know that means an element which has no protons in the nucleus. - This is a concept that wouldn't be new to scientists, in fact, it's probably one of the most abundant "elements" in the entire galaxy, there's even an extremely scientific name for it: a "vacuum".

Don't put stock in the science of sci-fi video games, most of it is what's called "soft" sci-fi [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_science_fiction], really just fantasy in space. (as opposed to "hard" sci-fi, where the technology is as much a focus of the story as the characters - sadly this hasn't taken off outside of books... yet... there's a new webseries that looks very interesting based on hard sci-fi...)

 

[Bara_no_Hime]

I believe that one of the best levels is Tali's loyalty mission. the writing while aboard the geth controlled vessel has some of the best writing i've seen in years. I too was a bit skeptic about that and I understand what you are saying, but it all comes down to this: i don't think bioware has any bio-medical scientists on hand, especially ones who specialize in a fictional race of people in purple helmets. by asking questions like this, you are asking for Mass Effect to turn into Star Wars, who has waayyyy too much information on the fictional races, thus ruining the fun of strange looking aliens

I agree - I love her loyalty mission. I ignore everyone but Garrus until I get Tali and can complete her loyalty mission. Then I take Tali on all my missions. I did that with Fem Shep, and I'm doing it again with Male Shep. ^^ I wish I could get Tali interested in Fem Shep.

And no, I don't want it to turn into Star Wars. Egads. But...

Words of advice: "Don't Over Think Science-Fiction"

See, that's my problem. The stuff about allergies isn't science fiction - it's modern science fact. I'm perfectly willing to suspend my disbelief for faster than light travel, communication, AI, VI, Geth, Reapers, Asari sexual practices, etc - because it's science fiction.

Clean environments giving people immune-response diseases. That's happening TODAY. Right now. Do you have asthma? It might be caused by growing up in an overly clean environment. Have severe allergies? Same thing. People on earth, right now, are having this problem. Projecting it onto an alien race and cranking the issue up to 11 is great - it's what sci-fi is founded on, but please GET IT RIGHT. It fails as a discussion of modern society (which is one reason Tali and the Quarians are so compelling) if you get your facts wrong or jumbled.

 

[Fr]anc[is]

Short version: She's alien, it works differently for her

I forget the exact reasoning, but the Quarians and Turians are different in that regard. It's like they have a different OS. A human disease can interact with the human OS and cause trouble. The quarian OS wouldn't be able to read it, and the disease couldn't do anything either. So perhaps the quarians have bad antivirus software, but their "idk wtf this is" response might be way too strong.

 

[funksobeefy]

who cares if it makes no sense, it makes a great story. it provides depth to her character

so great depth and story require nothing but people to ignore all the obvious mistakes of the writers? I guess that makes a lot of what we once thought really shitty games good.

I didnt like quariens and didnt like how Bioware pushed them in Mass Effect 2 just for fan service

 

[ryo02]

*SPOILERS* human experimentation on Tuchanka; Mordin says that humans make good test subjects because they have more varied reactions to stimuli, when in fact, this makes them bad test subjects because you want to narrow down variables,. *END SPOILERS*

could I just make a point? I may be wrong knowing nothing about this but doesnt what you said only apply if you cant track the variables?. with more computer memory faster processing and the ability to scan things in detail on the fly youd be abe to track and compensate for the variables. wouldnt a cure be best tested against the most varied subjects you can mannage then?. wouldnt that make predicting the reaction throughout the entire population easier?.

 

[Bosammou]

Think of it as an error in the translation from quarian to english, I mean the races can't have just been speaking english that'd be stupid.

 

[Bara_no_Hime]

anc[is]Short version: She's alien, it works differently for her

I forget the exact reasoning, but the Quarians and Turians are different in that regard. It's like they have a different OS. A human disease can interact with the human OS and cause trouble. The quarian OS wouldn't be able to read it, and the disease couldn't do anything either. So perhaps the quarians have bad antivirus software, but their "idk wtf this is" response might be way too strong.

Yes, I'm aware of this. I even mentioned it above (why quarians can't catch any human disease). So yes, it makes sense that they'd want to fix that logical error.

My issue is that they only half-fixed it. Half the time, Tali says what you said above. That's an allergic reaction - the body's system over reacting to something that can't harm it. But, she also talks about "weak immune systems" and "taking immune boosters" to leave her suit. A weak immune system can't have an allergic reaction, and immune boosters make allergic reactions worse.

How do I know? Because we have those and do that today. Again, tell me that aliens have a different type of DNA, I'm cool with that. Tell me that immune boosters will help an allergy and I cry foul the same way I would if you told me that I could freeze something by increasing its temperature. They are opposite terms - one cannot cause the other.

 

[loc978]

Pretty sure the "allergic reaction" bit was just an error that didn't get caught in editing.

 

[itsnotyouitsme]

-edited on next page-

 

[SamuelT]

If you want it to make sense you can take it in different ways. Such as Tali not being a medical person, and not exactly knowing how to prepare for something like that. That's why she was sickish, even after she used precautions. The ship she was on must've had the same, if not better, climate control. She shouldn't have become sick because of that, and because she used the boosters faulty she got sickish.

It's a stretch, but if it really bothers you that much you can use it to sooth your worries, I guess.

 

[Something Amyss]

She mis-used the word allergic then. Quarians have very little immune system so the germs and toxins we take for granted would kill them.

This slip on the writers part bothers me not at all

Actually, it sounds like they may have re4tconned it to fit the plot. So it's an intentional change, not an error. Gotta love it.

 

[itsnotyouitsme]

It did bother me a little bit but then again i think about it more and more and i've come with an answer.
If you live in clean ships since you were born your immune system would be weak from no practice. So when germs do come in contact with your skin you're poorly made immune system responds to this stimulus by inflaming the capillaries, heating the area, and sending white blood cells. This is less because of an allergic reaction and more because of opportunistic infections would see you as a gold mine thus your body will protect itself from everything, thus causing severe allergic reactions. However, if you increase your immune response then your body will be able to fight off the opportunistic infections and thus stopping the allergic reactions cause by the overreaction of the immune system of germs.
To put it another way: allergic reactions is when your immune system is out of order and just panics, the immune boosters cause your immune system to get it self together and fly straight for a while.

 

[Bara_no_Hime]

Think of it as an error in the translation from quarian to english, I mean the races can't have just been speaking english that'd be stupid.

I could almost buy that, if they weren't very specific, very opposite terms.

You wouldn't put an ice-cube tray full of water in the oven and expect it to freeze. You would put it in the freezer. Quarians might call a freezer something different, but they wouldn't call it an oven.

 

[Fr]anc[is]

anc[is]Short version: She's alien, it works differently for her

I forget the exact reasoning, but the Quarians and Turians are different in that regard. It's like they have a different OS. A human disease can interact with the human OS and cause trouble. The quarian OS wouldn't be able to read it, and the disease couldn't do anything either. So perhaps the quarians have bad antivirus software, but their "idk wtf this is" response might be way too strong.

Yes, I'm aware of this. I even mentioned it above (why quarians can't catch any human disease). So yes, it makes sense that they'd want to fix that logical error.

My issue is that they only half-fixed it. Half the time, Tali says what you said above. That's an allergic reaction - the body's system over reacting to something that can't harm it. But, she also talks about "weak immune systems" and "taking immune boosters" to leave her suit. A weak immune system can't have an allergic reaction, and immune boosters make allergic reactions worse.

How do I know? Because we have those and do that today. Again, tell me that aliens have a different type of DNA, I'm cool with that. Tell me that immune boosters will help an allergy and I cry foul the same way I would if you told me that I could freeze something by increasing its temperature. They are opposite terms - one cannot cause the other.

All that is how HUMAN immune systems work. She's not human. All that is out the window.