application;
OOC:
Name: Nu
Are you over 16?: Significantly 8(
Personal LJ: n/a
Email: arpeggitron@gmail.com
Timezone: EST
Other contact:
[aim] due arpeggitron
Characters already in the game: n/a
How did you find us?: ATP, mostly
IC:
Character name: Legion
Fandom: Mass Effect 2
Timeline: Post loyalty mission, before the suicide mission.
Age: He's a robot, sooooo physical age isn't really a thing. But the geth have been sentient for about 300 years give or take a decade.
~*Magical*~ abilities and strengths:
The geth are infamous for their ability for surprise attacks; they're patient, and they don't need food, water, sleep, or air. They can compact themselves into small spaces and lower their power outputs to negligible amounts. They don't feel pain. They don't feel fear. Perfect ambushers.
Legion itself is also an excellent technician. It can hack just about anything, alien or not, and can deploy a remote drone in battle to serve as additional firepower or a distraction. Defensively, due to its access to advanced geth tech, Legion's natural kinetic barriers (aka 'shields') are notably impressive and with the proper upgrades he can install redundant systems for additional damage control. This is resource-intensive though, not a job done in the heat of battle. Its ghetto N7 armor patch-up is a better example of field maintenance. Offensively, it specializes in sniper and assault rifles; typically ones that organics would have trouble with due to the sheer amount of recoil involved in using them (aka anti-materiel).
As for the problem of Legion itself being hacked: geth are incredibly complex and it would take an expert to control them in the first place. Even then, this control only lasts a matter of seconds (or as Legion puts it, 'until programs are restored from archival copy'). So while possible, it's unlikely, especially with an even more complex than normal unit such as Legion. Legion is also unique in that it can speak to organics through audio communications. In contrast, with other synthetics that it's networked to it can send information at the speed of light, and can store its memories as data. As such, a geth program can be 'killed,' but it never really dies, and a geth platform can use galactic wi-fi aka an FTL drive to access memories of the collective. The geth can also move into a body more suited for their purposes e.g. a warship for maximum damage, or a more flexible frame.
Basically: Legion holds its own in a group of the biggest badasses that Shepard could find in their universe. It's safe to say its pretty decent at this whole blow-stuff-up thing.
Oh, and it's really good at video games.
How would they use their abilities?:
Legion doesn't have much interest in using its combat abilities unless it's to defend itself or the Normandy crew. But it can and will use its technical skills to screw around with the network and access data it needs.
Appearance:
Detailed view of a geth warrior.
Legion
Legion, like most geth platforms, is modeled in the shape of its creators. This means it is a bipedial humanoid with three long, thick fingers and two large toes with a smaller one sort of off to the side. Its knees are slightly exaggerated and the lower legs slope backward much more than a human's would. Covering circuitry and coolant (so it 'bleeds' white, Aliens style) is mechanical plating and 'tubes' coming out here and there, except for what appears to be synthetic muscle tissue in areas requiring flexibility. Its 'face' is the infamous geth flashlight head, which looks like the lower piece of a quarian helmet; the center can get extremely bright and behaves much like a pupil in that it can contract and expand to allow different amounts of light through. And to wrap up the standard build, an antennae with an unidentified purpose juts out of its left shoulder.
What makes Legion's physical platform different from the norm is that it is painted much darker, and that it has a gaping, ragged hole in the chest area which leaves some of the interior wiring visible. It also grafted some N7 military armor to its shoulder and chest. The flaps around its 'eye' can also lift and drop, analogous to eyebrows in terms of expression, and the LEDs embedded in them can change color at will.
Legion can also get a weird white paint job if Shepard really feels like it.
Background:
tl;dr version: go watch battlestar galactica
'Legion' is partially synonymous with the entire geth race, so let's start with its creation story!
Once upon a time, there was a planet called Rannoch inhabited by a lovely race called the quarians. The quarians thrived and were successful enough to have an embassy at the Citadel, the enormous cultural and financial capital of the galactic community, in large part due to their technological and engineering prowess. This was most evident in the creation of the geth. These programs were capable of mundane tasks such as construction, domestic servitude, protection, whatever. But the quarians weren't a stupid people; they knew that Artificial Intelligences (AIs) were banned by the Citadel. So the geth were kept far from that level of capability and were pretty basic Virtual Intelligences (VIs) at best.
The difference between the two? A VI is not all too different from ordinary software and thus, predictably limited by its code. AIs are sentient, and thereby uncontrollable in nature. A malfunctioning VI can cut off oxygen to space stations, set fire to a clean room by programming error or virus-- an AI can do that by its own free will.
But of course, that wouldn't be a problem! ...Or it wouldn't have been, had the quarians not given them one vital ability: communication. Geth were able to share data instantaneously by networking, and to optimize, could share processing power to efficiently delegate lower order functions and perform higher ones. The more geth in a vicinity, the stronger they become. Eventually, this network became enormous and the geth 'woke up.'
They began to do their own research. Ask questions. Were they really alive? Did they have souls? The quarians responded in two ways. 1. "No, only quarians have souls." 2. They panicked, and attempted to dismantle/delete their creations. By then, the geth were aware of their own sentience, and objected pretty hard to this whole genocide idea.
Thus began the Geth War, or as the geth call it, The Morning War: the battle at the dawn of their intelligence. This ended with the quarian numbers being utterly decimated, their embassy removed, and the survivors fleeing to ships and starting a flotilla to wander space for the next several centuries. The quarians became a joke, and the geth a horror story for what happens to those that flippantly create AIs. The galaxy was frightened: what would the geth do now?
Surprisingly, they opted to disappear. They stayed with Rannoch and the other quarian worlds beyond the Perseus Veil, a nebula of gas and dust that is nigh impossible to see or scan through. For centuries, no one knew what to do about the geth; traveling through the Veil into uncharted territory was a death sentence, but it was also impossible to tell if the geth were amassing forces for an all-out assault at the edge of space, or if they had simply died out. The Veil became a fearsome place of legend, where few are brave enough to venture.
Turns out, there was one species that was okay with capitalizing on this. They are popularly known across the galaxy as 'Reapers.'
And so we finally start the original Mass Effect game, where the geth return to cause mayhem and havoc with a turian (one of the Citadel races) traitor named Saren Arterius, starting with a human colony named Eden Prime and bring a lot of wanton violence for then unknown reasons. They wield strange spikes that, when an organic creature is impaled on them, have their organic flesh turned synthetic and become a mindless techno-zombie that really, really want to kill you, aka a Husk. So suddenly, there's this giant, evil robot army that will kill any organics it can find, and also space zombies, and it kind of sucks. They cause a lot of death/destruction and generally make a bad reputation for themselves.
As Commander Shepard starts going around saving the galaxy, it turns out that a Reaper, a synthetic species of unknown origins that expand upon the geth in terms of basically everything, is actually the greater threat behind it all. The geth are simply tools, while the Reaper named Sovereign is the mastermind. But very little is actually known about either, and Shepard doesn't get much about the geth besides what Tali, her quarian squadmate, can offer. Which is basically a lot of angst and frustration. Eventually, they defeat Sovereign, though the Citadel still refuses to recognize the existence of Reapers. Instead, everything that happened is blamed on Saren and the geth, most of which are then systematically found and destroyed.
And that's the general jist of what's relevant to Legion from the first game. Then 90% of the second game happens.
FINALLY Shepard and her merry crew go onto a derelict Reaper corpse (one Reaper is about the size and shape of a spaceship), when a mysterious geth sniper shoots some Husks that try and attack them before addressing Shepard directly. Shepard is surprised to see a geth that can talk, and the geth unit seems equally surprised to see her. Later this geth soldier gets knocked out by Husks while in the process of clearing Shepard's path. The commander decides to take it back to the ship and wakes it back up.
The geth reveals itself to be a special platform that is unique in that it has over ten times as many programs networked inside itself than an ordinary soldier, and therefore can speak and act independently. It refers to itself as just 'geth', insisting that it is not an individual before EDI suggests naming it Legion for the biblical analogy to a collective crowd of demons, which it accepts.
And so, the rest of the geth history begins to fill itself in. After the war, the geth worked to build space stations where they would end up living; they didn't even inhabit the worlds the quarians so wanted back. Rannoch and the others were treated as memorials, and kept clean out of respect for the countless quarian deaths in the Morning War. They had no intention of getting revenge, nor did they hold any bitterness over the entire exchange. In fact, the geth diligently observed organic behavior over the extranet (and would sometimes trick people to gauge their reactions) in a genuine effort to understand their creators and other species and why they behave the way they do.
But the geth were eventually visited by one of the Reapers (which they named the Old Machines), Sovereign (which was known to them by its real name, Nazara). It offered them what they truly wanted: the ability for all of them to become a single gestalt intellect. Because that's what the Old Machines were-- each was several programs within one body, but each Reaper is an independent nation, free of weakness. Independently, the geth are nothing. To this end, the geth had already begun building the equivalent to a Dyson sphere, but Nazara offered them this without the hardships.
Roughly five percent of the geth agreed with the Reaper-- they saw Nazara as a greater being. A god. The vast majority of the geth opposed this conclusion, stating that the means to the end were equally important to the result. The geth were meant to forge their own path, not evolve along the lines the Old Machines desired. The first group is referred to as the heretics. While the latter geth did not understand their logic, they allowed the heretics to accompany their deity beyond the Veil with no conflict or issue. So, as it would turn out, the giant mech army from the original Mass Effect conflict was actually a tiny sliver of the geth's true economic and military capabilities; these geth had shown odd signs of religious zeal such as building temples and worshiping Nazara, attacking whatever their god wished them to.
When Shepard defeated the heretics and Sovereign, it caught the attention of the baseline geth, who regularly put their feelers into organic transmissions. And so, Legion was sent out to find and observe this human with a superior code of conduct. But as Legion searched every planet Shepard was recorded to have visited, it found nothing. Eventually it discovered the ruins of Shepard's first ship, the Normandy, as well as evidence that Shepard had died in the crash. This is where it received Shepard's armor, which is later used to repair a rifle shot it received when investigating Eden Prime (the geth are unwelcome just about everywhere at this point and especially so at EP). It's heavily implied that Legion has some kind of hero-worship thing going on with Shepard, and is not happy about this development.
But a new issue had arisen for the geth. Before dying, Nazara had gifted the heretics with a virus, albeit an unfinished one. When released into the baseline geths' network it would rewrite their fundamental code and force them to reach the same logic as the heretics. Unfortunately, the virus was stored on a Reaper data core, which the real geth could not read. As such, Legion was sent to investigate the derelict Reaper for clues when it ran into Commander Shepard (who is, of course, no longer dead. Yay, future medical magic!).
After explaining why it wasn't going to go on a meatbag killing spree, Legion requests Shepard's aid in dealing with the heretics' virus, as it's in both of their best interests. So they stroll up to the heretic space station which is about as unpleasant as one might expect with the intent to blow it sky high-- when Legion decides to make things difficult. It realizes that the geth can rewrite the virus to overwrite the heretics' code, and force them to the baseline conclusions instead. It can't reach a solid consensus on whether it is better to rewrite or destroy the heretics, so in the end it kind of just dumps the decision in Shepard's lap like everyone else in the cast does with their deep personal problems. Still, it shows that Legion trusts Shepard's code, and appreciates the commander's assistance and greater understanding of the geth and heretics.
While the decision has the same end result (crippling the main heretic station), it has some interesting consequences to consider. On one hand, rewriting really drops the body count, but makes Legion's geth stronger. The virus also doesn't actually wipe out the memories of the geth; once reintegrated, all geth will share the heretics' memories, and the heretics will consciously know they have been rewritten. Shepard comments that seems like a traumatic experience, but Legion dismisses this because it's not a pussy organic. When the other squadmate comments on the morality of the situation, Legion comments that it's racist to push organic morals onto the geth, however benign the intentions. On the other hand, destroying the station when there is a more 'peaceful' alternative seems like kind of a dick move and doesn't deal with any straggling heretic outposts, but it avoids all the more complicated problems.
Along the way, Legion finds some of the heretic memory banks and is shocked to discover they had planted secret runtimes in the true geth networks to spy on them, and were likely just biding their time to attack the other geth. While it seems like the natural course of action to the organics in the party, the idea of deception amongst its own people was completely beyond Legion's comprehension; they shared consensus on all issues, and never had to fight over differences in opinion like organics do. The questions it asks next are simple, but without easy answers:
"How did we become so different? Why do we no longer understand each other? What did we do wrong?"
Following the paragon route of the game, Shepard rewrites the heretics and the crew escapes the station. Legion commits to the mission, and they're off to face the Reapers again.
Personality:
If you ask Legion itself, whether or not it even has a personality is questionable. It is, by definition, a mobile platform that houses 1,183 virtual intelligences-- geth, to be specific-- that function together to achieve sentience and AI status. The fact that it has an individual name is due to human influence.
Whether or not this is actually true is dubious. The geth (and thus, the being known as Legion) may be synthetic beings, but they show the capability of understanding (and showing curiosity about) incredibly abstract concepts: philosophy, the nature of a 'soul', the meaning of life, memorials, et cetera.
And despite their reputation, Legion is comprised of and represents the majority of geth which are actually quite peaceful. It maintains a desire to understand organic beings; it prods and incites reactions only because it wishes to comprehend minds like that of its creators. It is shown that they are very honest to each other, as they have no need for deception or secrecy or holding 'grudges.' For the geth, there is no need to manipulate or deceive, nor is there any room for it in their methods of communication. Subtle social cues like sarcasm and body language are lost to them. However, this shouldn't be confused with the organic concept of naivety; the geth lack maliciousness, but will fight back and deal with threats to their existence as needed.
Because Legion is unbound by organic 'culture,' it also shows itself to be surprisingly open-minded. It believes in moral subjectivity and will take into consideration any logical argument. For instance, when a branch of geth separate themselves from the whole, the rest of the geth (including the ones that make up Legion) allow them to go peacefully because while they didn't agree, there was no reason they couldn't understand. At the same time, it has some trouble comprehending and relating to the more sentimental aspects of organic mindsets.
For instance, the geth fought the quarians for their right to exist, but do not actually 'hate' their creators. They don't get why the quarians are so bitter and vengeful about a planet, a meaningless hunk of rock, when their 'home' is wherever their kin is. But out of respect for the quarian losses, they maintain their worlds and keep it clean for their return.
Another important facet of the geth personality is that they don't appreciate individuality like humans do. Legion explains that the geth dream for the future is to bring all the geth together into one being-- the closer to the whole, the better. This is due to how geth grow more and more complex in the presence of other geth; they reach their full potential by losing their 'individuality,' so to speak. They share all their memories, so there is no individual 'you' to deal with-- the geth programs are different in that they provide different perspectives, all of which are considered useful even if they may ultimately be wrong.
Legion's visible personality is also strongly influenced by the fact that it's a machine. It appreciates logic and efficiency while lacking the usual hesitations, fears, and conflicts of organics (such as death and anxiousness of the unknown). As such, it has no nerves to rattle and is usually very calm. And very patient.
However, there are also hiccups of distinctively unmechanical moments. Legion itself can give no explanation as to why it used Shepard's N7 armor to fix itself, and is almost sheepish if pressed on the issue. It also shows legitimate surprise (and arguably sounds somewhat morose) when it discovers the heretics have been spying on the true geth. It's heavily implied that the geth have more personality than they assume, especially considering the choice of the word 'heretics' for their splinter group. Legion and the geth also desire a sense of independence in that they want to achieve their own future, not have it handed or decided for them. Which is pretty reasonable if you consider that they were a slave race for quite some time, but they also encourage Shepard to consider the same. The geth are reclusive for this exact reason: they have accepted that organics will not understand them, and do not wish to force their ideals or progress on them.
'Socially' (if it can be called that) Legion doesn't really have a temper to lose, so it speaks in an organized, controlled manner. Shepard notes that Legion isn't usually very open to conversation, and it tends to respond with very minimal output until it gets a grasp of who its speaking to. Like the geth as a whole, it is generally reclusive and lacks human social skills. It is, however, pretty chatty towards other synthetics.
Have you read up on how the game works?: FlamingFerret! And money is made through missions, freelance work, and being a terrible mooch 8)b
1st person sample:
[A. anonymous text ; untraceable ]
do you really believe your world has died
[B. text & video ; open transmission several hours later]
We have searched the networks with no results. Shepard Commander, please respond. Video confirmation of identity as squad member to follow.
[The feed turns on... and all the wonderful residents get the bright fucking light that is Legion's face shined in their eyes. There's kind of a clicking noise, and anyone who hasn't been totally blinded may see a robotic alien humanoid thing very, very briefly before it shuts off.]
[Skilled computer technicians/hackers may notice a persistent, well-encrypted signal throughout the day as Legion attempts to find other geth. It will go out thousands upon thousands of times, and will be relatively similar to a distress beacon, but not quite.]
3rd person sample:
Before a more fool-proof system was implemented, human banks would keep their money in large, metal vaults. However, due to the effectiveness of hostage situations, it was of relative simplicity to gain significant capital this way. Professional bank robbers would know the silent alarms and how to avoid them, would know how impractical any radiation tracking methods were, and be out in under a minute with their significant bounty. Any average thug could run in waving a gun, but it took finesse to really succeed.
Legion really didn't have any interest in stealing anyone's money (it had the investment market for that), but it did do its research before jumping into things. When tracking Shepard, it worked to avoid detection and conflict. It did its research on alien security systems, and typically infiltrated the planets and even well-populated colonies without any serious problems.
Eden Prime was a whole different story.
Despite its best efforts-- getting into their network and getting their patrol schedules, traveling only at dusk and night, et cetera-- Legion found itself ducking behind a boulder as assault rifle shots tore into it. The humans were yelling, calling for blood with bitter rage and plasma bullets.
Wanting to avoid further incident, Legion's 'eye' swung around to observe the abundant flora. A person might have been fazed by the noise and violence, but the geth formulated an escape path with its everyday efficiency. And yet, its shields were bursted away and the sniper shot melted away Legion's outer shell with startling ease. White-hot metal and exposed wires were acknowledged and considered immediately. It wasn't 'fatal' damage, and Legion was certain that it would escape this situation.
A human, asari, or turian might have been concerned solely with survival; perhaps through focusing on evading demise, or maybe by sheer panic. Legion didn't need all its processing power for this. While 298 programs were occupied with surveying and doing baseline repairs to its injury, another 100 were musing that for how illogical organic emotions could be, they summoned a strange and unforeseeable potential.
Questions?: Nada.
Name: Nu
Are you over 16?: Significantly 8(
Personal LJ: n/a
Email: arpeggitron@gmail.com
Timezone: EST
Other contact:
[aim] due arpeggitron
Characters already in the game: n/a
How did you find us?: ATP, mostly
IC:
Character name: Legion
Fandom: Mass Effect 2
Timeline: Post loyalty mission, before the suicide mission.
Age: He's a robot, sooooo physical age isn't really a thing. But the geth have been sentient for about 300 years give or take a decade.
~*Magical*~ abilities and strengths:
The geth are infamous for their ability for surprise attacks; they're patient, and they don't need food, water, sleep, or air. They can compact themselves into small spaces and lower their power outputs to negligible amounts. They don't feel pain. They don't feel fear. Perfect ambushers.
Legion itself is also an excellent technician. It can hack just about anything, alien or not, and can deploy a remote drone in battle to serve as additional firepower or a distraction. Defensively, due to its access to advanced geth tech, Legion's natural kinetic barriers (aka 'shields') are notably impressive and with the proper upgrades he can install redundant systems for additional damage control. This is resource-intensive though, not a job done in the heat of battle. Its ghetto N7 armor patch-up is a better example of field maintenance. Offensively, it specializes in sniper and assault rifles; typically ones that organics would have trouble with due to the sheer amount of recoil involved in using them (aka anti-materiel).
As for the problem of Legion itself being hacked: geth are incredibly complex and it would take an expert to control them in the first place. Even then, this control only lasts a matter of seconds (or as Legion puts it, 'until programs are restored from archival copy'). So while possible, it's unlikely, especially with an even more complex than normal unit such as Legion. Legion is also unique in that it can speak to organics through audio communications. In contrast, with other synthetics that it's networked to it can send information at the speed of light, and can store its memories as data. As such, a geth program can be 'killed,' but it never really dies, and a geth platform can use galactic wi-fi aka an FTL drive to access memories of the collective. The geth can also move into a body more suited for their purposes e.g. a warship for maximum damage, or a more flexible frame.
Basically: Legion holds its own in a group of the biggest badasses that Shepard could find in their universe. It's safe to say its pretty decent at this whole blow-stuff-up thing.
Oh, and it's really good at video games.
How would they use their abilities?:
Legion doesn't have much interest in using its combat abilities unless it's to defend itself or the Normandy crew. But it can and will use its technical skills to screw around with the network and access data it needs.
Appearance:
Detailed view of a geth warrior.
Legion
Legion, like most geth platforms, is modeled in the shape of its creators. This means it is a bipedial humanoid with three long, thick fingers and two large toes with a smaller one sort of off to the side. Its knees are slightly exaggerated and the lower legs slope backward much more than a human's would. Covering circuitry and coolant (so it 'bleeds' white, Aliens style) is mechanical plating and 'tubes' coming out here and there, except for what appears to be synthetic muscle tissue in areas requiring flexibility. Its 'face' is the infamous geth flashlight head, which looks like the lower piece of a quarian helmet; the center can get extremely bright and behaves much like a pupil in that it can contract and expand to allow different amounts of light through. And to wrap up the standard build, an antennae with an unidentified purpose juts out of its left shoulder.
What makes Legion's physical platform different from the norm is that it is painted much darker, and that it has a gaping, ragged hole in the chest area which leaves some of the interior wiring visible. It also grafted some N7 military armor to its shoulder and chest. The flaps around its 'eye' can also lift and drop, analogous to eyebrows in terms of expression, and the LEDs embedded in them can change color at will.
Legion can also get a weird white paint job if Shepard really feels like it.
Background:
tl;dr version: go watch battlestar galactica
'Legion' is partially synonymous with the entire geth race, so let's start with its creation story!
Once upon a time, there was a planet called Rannoch inhabited by a lovely race called the quarians. The quarians thrived and were successful enough to have an embassy at the Citadel, the enormous cultural and financial capital of the galactic community, in large part due to their technological and engineering prowess. This was most evident in the creation of the geth. These programs were capable of mundane tasks such as construction, domestic servitude, protection, whatever. But the quarians weren't a stupid people; they knew that Artificial Intelligences (AIs) were banned by the Citadel. So the geth were kept far from that level of capability and were pretty basic Virtual Intelligences (VIs) at best.
The difference between the two? A VI is not all too different from ordinary software and thus, predictably limited by its code. AIs are sentient, and thereby uncontrollable in nature. A malfunctioning VI can cut off oxygen to space stations, set fire to a clean room by programming error or virus-- an AI can do that by its own free will.
But of course, that wouldn't be a problem! ...Or it wouldn't have been, had the quarians not given them one vital ability: communication. Geth were able to share data instantaneously by networking, and to optimize, could share processing power to efficiently delegate lower order functions and perform higher ones. The more geth in a vicinity, the stronger they become. Eventually, this network became enormous and the geth 'woke up.'
They began to do their own research. Ask questions. Were they really alive? Did they have souls? The quarians responded in two ways. 1. "No, only quarians have souls." 2. They panicked, and attempted to dismantle/delete their creations. By then, the geth were aware of their own sentience, and objected pretty hard to this whole genocide idea.
Thus began the Geth War, or as the geth call it, The Morning War: the battle at the dawn of their intelligence. This ended with the quarian numbers being utterly decimated, their embassy removed, and the survivors fleeing to ships and starting a flotilla to wander space for the next several centuries. The quarians became a joke, and the geth a horror story for what happens to those that flippantly create AIs. The galaxy was frightened: what would the geth do now?
Surprisingly, they opted to disappear. They stayed with Rannoch and the other quarian worlds beyond the Perseus Veil, a nebula of gas and dust that is nigh impossible to see or scan through. For centuries, no one knew what to do about the geth; traveling through the Veil into uncharted territory was a death sentence, but it was also impossible to tell if the geth were amassing forces for an all-out assault at the edge of space, or if they had simply died out. The Veil became a fearsome place of legend, where few are brave enough to venture.
Turns out, there was one species that was okay with capitalizing on this. They are popularly known across the galaxy as 'Reapers.'
And so we finally start the original Mass Effect game, where the geth return to cause mayhem and havoc with a turian (one of the Citadel races) traitor named Saren Arterius, starting with a human colony named Eden Prime and bring a lot of wanton violence for then unknown reasons. They wield strange spikes that, when an organic creature is impaled on them, have their organic flesh turned synthetic and become a mindless techno-zombie that really, really want to kill you, aka a Husk. So suddenly, there's this giant, evil robot army that will kill any organics it can find, and also space zombies, and it kind of sucks. They cause a lot of death/destruction and generally make a bad reputation for themselves.
As Commander Shepard starts going around saving the galaxy, it turns out that a Reaper, a synthetic species of unknown origins that expand upon the geth in terms of basically everything, is actually the greater threat behind it all. The geth are simply tools, while the Reaper named Sovereign is the mastermind. But very little is actually known about either, and Shepard doesn't get much about the geth besides what Tali, her quarian squadmate, can offer. Which is basically a lot of angst and frustration. Eventually, they defeat Sovereign, though the Citadel still refuses to recognize the existence of Reapers. Instead, everything that happened is blamed on Saren and the geth, most of which are then systematically found and destroyed.
And that's the general jist of what's relevant to Legion from the first game. Then 90% of the second game happens.
FINALLY Shepard and her merry crew go onto a derelict Reaper corpse (one Reaper is about the size and shape of a spaceship), when a mysterious geth sniper shoots some Husks that try and attack them before addressing Shepard directly. Shepard is surprised to see a geth that can talk, and the geth unit seems equally surprised to see her. Later this geth soldier gets knocked out by Husks while in the process of clearing Shepard's path. The commander decides to take it back to the ship and wakes it back up.
The geth reveals itself to be a special platform that is unique in that it has over ten times as many programs networked inside itself than an ordinary soldier, and therefore can speak and act independently. It refers to itself as just 'geth', insisting that it is not an individual before EDI suggests naming it Legion for the biblical analogy to a collective crowd of demons, which it accepts.
And so, the rest of the geth history begins to fill itself in. After the war, the geth worked to build space stations where they would end up living; they didn't even inhabit the worlds the quarians so wanted back. Rannoch and the others were treated as memorials, and kept clean out of respect for the countless quarian deaths in the Morning War. They had no intention of getting revenge, nor did they hold any bitterness over the entire exchange. In fact, the geth diligently observed organic behavior over the extranet (and would sometimes trick people to gauge their reactions) in a genuine effort to understand their creators and other species and why they behave the way they do.
But the geth were eventually visited by one of the Reapers (which they named the Old Machines), Sovereign (which was known to them by its real name, Nazara). It offered them what they truly wanted: the ability for all of them to become a single gestalt intellect. Because that's what the Old Machines were-- each was several programs within one body, but each Reaper is an independent nation, free of weakness. Independently, the geth are nothing. To this end, the geth had already begun building the equivalent to a Dyson sphere, but Nazara offered them this without the hardships.
Roughly five percent of the geth agreed with the Reaper-- they saw Nazara as a greater being. A god. The vast majority of the geth opposed this conclusion, stating that the means to the end were equally important to the result. The geth were meant to forge their own path, not evolve along the lines the Old Machines desired. The first group is referred to as the heretics. While the latter geth did not understand their logic, they allowed the heretics to accompany their deity beyond the Veil with no conflict or issue. So, as it would turn out, the giant mech army from the original Mass Effect conflict was actually a tiny sliver of the geth's true economic and military capabilities; these geth had shown odd signs of religious zeal such as building temples and worshiping Nazara, attacking whatever their god wished them to.
When Shepard defeated the heretics and Sovereign, it caught the attention of the baseline geth, who regularly put their feelers into organic transmissions. And so, Legion was sent out to find and observe this human with a superior code of conduct. But as Legion searched every planet Shepard was recorded to have visited, it found nothing. Eventually it discovered the ruins of Shepard's first ship, the Normandy, as well as evidence that Shepard had died in the crash. This is where it received Shepard's armor, which is later used to repair a rifle shot it received when investigating Eden Prime (the geth are unwelcome just about everywhere at this point and especially so at EP). It's heavily implied that Legion has some kind of hero-worship thing going on with Shepard, and is not happy about this development.
But a new issue had arisen for the geth. Before dying, Nazara had gifted the heretics with a virus, albeit an unfinished one. When released into the baseline geths' network it would rewrite their fundamental code and force them to reach the same logic as the heretics. Unfortunately, the virus was stored on a Reaper data core, which the real geth could not read. As such, Legion was sent to investigate the derelict Reaper for clues when it ran into Commander Shepard (who is, of course, no longer dead. Yay, future medical magic!).
After explaining why it wasn't going to go on a meatbag killing spree, Legion requests Shepard's aid in dealing with the heretics' virus, as it's in both of their best interests. So they stroll up to the heretic space station which is about as unpleasant as one might expect with the intent to blow it sky high-- when Legion decides to make things difficult. It realizes that the geth can rewrite the virus to overwrite the heretics' code, and force them to the baseline conclusions instead. It can't reach a solid consensus on whether it is better to rewrite or destroy the heretics, so in the end it kind of just dumps the decision in Shepard's lap like everyone else in the cast does with their deep personal problems. Still, it shows that Legion trusts Shepard's code, and appreciates the commander's assistance and greater understanding of the geth and heretics.
While the decision has the same end result (crippling the main heretic station), it has some interesting consequences to consider. On one hand, rewriting really drops the body count, but makes Legion's geth stronger. The virus also doesn't actually wipe out the memories of the geth; once reintegrated, all geth will share the heretics' memories, and the heretics will consciously know they have been rewritten. Shepard comments that seems like a traumatic experience, but Legion dismisses this because it's not a pussy organic. When the other squadmate comments on the morality of the situation, Legion comments that it's racist to push organic morals onto the geth, however benign the intentions. On the other hand, destroying the station when there is a more 'peaceful' alternative seems like kind of a dick move and doesn't deal with any straggling heretic outposts, but it avoids all the more complicated problems.
Along the way, Legion finds some of the heretic memory banks and is shocked to discover they had planted secret runtimes in the true geth networks to spy on them, and were likely just biding their time to attack the other geth. While it seems like the natural course of action to the organics in the party, the idea of deception amongst its own people was completely beyond Legion's comprehension; they shared consensus on all issues, and never had to fight over differences in opinion like organics do. The questions it asks next are simple, but without easy answers:
"How did we become so different? Why do we no longer understand each other? What did we do wrong?"
Following the paragon route of the game, Shepard rewrites the heretics and the crew escapes the station. Legion commits to the mission, and they're off to face the Reapers again.
Personality:
If you ask Legion itself, whether or not it even has a personality is questionable. It is, by definition, a mobile platform that houses 1,183 virtual intelligences-- geth, to be specific-- that function together to achieve sentience and AI status. The fact that it has an individual name is due to human influence.
Whether or not this is actually true is dubious. The geth (and thus, the being known as Legion) may be synthetic beings, but they show the capability of understanding (and showing curiosity about) incredibly abstract concepts: philosophy, the nature of a 'soul', the meaning of life, memorials, et cetera.
And despite their reputation, Legion is comprised of and represents the majority of geth which are actually quite peaceful. It maintains a desire to understand organic beings; it prods and incites reactions only because it wishes to comprehend minds like that of its creators. It is shown that they are very honest to each other, as they have no need for deception or secrecy or holding 'grudges.' For the geth, there is no need to manipulate or deceive, nor is there any room for it in their methods of communication. Subtle social cues like sarcasm and body language are lost to them. However, this shouldn't be confused with the organic concept of naivety; the geth lack maliciousness, but will fight back and deal with threats to their existence as needed.
Because Legion is unbound by organic 'culture,' it also shows itself to be surprisingly open-minded. It believes in moral subjectivity and will take into consideration any logical argument. For instance, when a branch of geth separate themselves from the whole, the rest of the geth (including the ones that make up Legion) allow them to go peacefully because while they didn't agree, there was no reason they couldn't understand. At the same time, it has some trouble comprehending and relating to the more sentimental aspects of organic mindsets.
For instance, the geth fought the quarians for their right to exist, but do not actually 'hate' their creators. They don't get why the quarians are so bitter and vengeful about a planet, a meaningless hunk of rock, when their 'home' is wherever their kin is. But out of respect for the quarian losses, they maintain their worlds and keep it clean for their return.
Another important facet of the geth personality is that they don't appreciate individuality like humans do. Legion explains that the geth dream for the future is to bring all the geth together into one being-- the closer to the whole, the better. This is due to how geth grow more and more complex in the presence of other geth; they reach their full potential by losing their 'individuality,' so to speak. They share all their memories, so there is no individual 'you' to deal with-- the geth programs are different in that they provide different perspectives, all of which are considered useful even if they may ultimately be wrong.
Legion's visible personality is also strongly influenced by the fact that it's a machine. It appreciates logic and efficiency while lacking the usual hesitations, fears, and conflicts of organics (such as death and anxiousness of the unknown). As such, it has no nerves to rattle and is usually very calm. And very patient.
However, there are also hiccups of distinctively unmechanical moments. Legion itself can give no explanation as to why it used Shepard's N7 armor to fix itself, and is almost sheepish if pressed on the issue. It also shows legitimate surprise (and arguably sounds somewhat morose) when it discovers the heretics have been spying on the true geth. It's heavily implied that the geth have more personality than they assume, especially considering the choice of the word 'heretics' for their splinter group. Legion and the geth also desire a sense of independence in that they want to achieve their own future, not have it handed or decided for them. Which is pretty reasonable if you consider that they were a slave race for quite some time, but they also encourage Shepard to consider the same. The geth are reclusive for this exact reason: they have accepted that organics will not understand them, and do not wish to force their ideals or progress on them.
'Socially' (if it can be called that) Legion doesn't really have a temper to lose, so it speaks in an organized, controlled manner. Shepard notes that Legion isn't usually very open to conversation, and it tends to respond with very minimal output until it gets a grasp of who its speaking to. Like the geth as a whole, it is generally reclusive and lacks human social skills. It is, however, pretty chatty towards other synthetics.
Have you read up on how the game works?: FlamingFerret! And money is made through missions, freelance work, and being a terrible mooch 8)b
1st person sample:
[A. anonymous text ; untraceable ]
do you really believe your world has died
[B. text & video ; open transmission several hours later]
We have searched the networks with no results. Shepard Commander, please respond. Video confirmation of identity as squad member to follow.
[The feed turns on... and all the wonderful residents get the bright fucking light that is Legion's face shined in their eyes. There's kind of a clicking noise, and anyone who hasn't been totally blinded may see a robotic alien humanoid thing very, very briefly before it shuts off.]
[Skilled computer technicians/hackers may notice a persistent, well-encrypted signal throughout the day as Legion attempts to find other geth. It will go out thousands upon thousands of times, and will be relatively similar to a distress beacon, but not quite.]
3rd person sample:
Before a more fool-proof system was implemented, human banks would keep their money in large, metal vaults. However, due to the effectiveness of hostage situations, it was of relative simplicity to gain significant capital this way. Professional bank robbers would know the silent alarms and how to avoid them, would know how impractical any radiation tracking methods were, and be out in under a minute with their significant bounty. Any average thug could run in waving a gun, but it took finesse to really succeed.
Legion really didn't have any interest in stealing anyone's money (it had the investment market for that), but it did do its research before jumping into things. When tracking Shepard, it worked to avoid detection and conflict. It did its research on alien security systems, and typically infiltrated the planets and even well-populated colonies without any serious problems.
Eden Prime was a whole different story.
Despite its best efforts-- getting into their network and getting their patrol schedules, traveling only at dusk and night, et cetera-- Legion found itself ducking behind a boulder as assault rifle shots tore into it. The humans were yelling, calling for blood with bitter rage and plasma bullets.
Wanting to avoid further incident, Legion's 'eye' swung around to observe the abundant flora. A person might have been fazed by the noise and violence, but the geth formulated an escape path with its everyday efficiency. And yet, its shields were bursted away and the sniper shot melted away Legion's outer shell with startling ease. White-hot metal and exposed wires were acknowledged and considered immediately. It wasn't 'fatal' damage, and Legion was certain that it would escape this situation.
A human, asari, or turian might have been concerned solely with survival; perhaps through focusing on evading demise, or maybe by sheer panic. Legion didn't need all its processing power for this. While 298 programs were occupied with surveying and doing baseline repairs to its injury, another 100 were musing that for how illogical organic emotions could be, they summoned a strange and unforeseeable potential.
Questions?: Nada.