Who do you did you think was the cooler reaper?

I say it was easily Sovereign. Sovereign was cunning, pragmatic, and menacing. He managed to indoctrinated one of the galaxy's best spectres, took control of an entire geth faction, and nearly took control of the Citadel. He also had some of the most badass and chilling speeches ever.

Harbinger on the other hand was a fucking annoying troll. His lines and speeches were so comical they become popular internet memes. His actions, plans, and motivations were contrived compared to Sovereigns. He's a joke among the face of reapers, and the conversation you have with him in Arrival was lame compared to Sovereign's on Virmire. Sovereign wins, hands down IMO.

BTW, this is coming from someone who likes Mass Effect 2 more than the original Mass Effect. :)

Sovereign without a doubt.

Yeah, Sovereign heh

Not even a contest, Sovereign hands down.

Sovereign. Harbinger sucked balls.

Sovereign represented a herald of a space Cthulu beyond our comprehension that was influencing our very existence since the beginning just to destroy it for reasons we can't fathom.

Harbinger is a space monster that you can shoot to kill because it needs food.

Sovereign was fucking awesome. Harbringer was a stupid villain.

You have no idea how fucking impressed I was by that conversation when I first partook in it. Jeebus.

I agree completely. There's no way Bioware is going to pull off a greater villain than Sovereign in Mass Effect 3. That Virmire encounter and meeting Vigil was some of the best moments in the story for me.

Isn't Harbinger a collector, not a reaper?

Edit: Don't worry just looked it up, got my villains confused.

Sovereign. Anyone who says otherwise has clearly huffed too much paint.
 
Mass Effect 1: Mechanical space-gods who only allow life in the universe to exist so that they can harvest them. Takes an entire galactic coalition to destroy their paperboy.
Mass Effect 2: Giant hungry spaceships, but they're lazy so they employ an army of space-bugs.
Mass Effect 3: Evil spaceships of whom it takes an entire army to destroy a single planet. Entire army easily halted by Commender Broface McWomanizer - who spends more time trying to fuck his crew than actually fighting -  and one of those Sarlaccs from the first game.

Yeah, Sovereign was definitely a more menacing presence in ME1 than Harbinger was in ME2. Although for ME2, I thought The Illusive Man and Harbinger were sort of both the villains. At which point I would say The Illusive Man is the best villain.

@Liquidus said:

Yeah, Sovereign was definitely a more menacing presence in ME1 than Harbinger was in ME2. Although for ME2, I thought The Illusive Man and Harbinger were sort of both the villains. At which point I would say The Illusive Man is the best villain.

The Illusive Man isn't a villain, he's an anti-hero and not a very good one at that.

Still, DAT Sheen.

ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL

@Liquidus said:

Yeah, Sovereign was definitely a more menacing presence in ME1 than Harbinger was in ME2. Although for ME2, I thought The Illusive Man and Harbinger were sort of both the villains. At which point I would say The Illusive Man is the best villain.

The Illusive Man is the Gman of Mass Effect, in fact Cerberus is the Aperture of Mass Effect.

sovereign. the conversation you have with it (it, him?) in mass effect 1 is legitimately kind of intimidating. harbringer was meme fuel.

Seriously tough I have to agree with Sovreign, that moment when you discover what Reapers are is like the oh shit moment in Kotor

Not as powerful but powerful nontheless

Habinger was a joke. He didn't even show up; the entire game he was just controlling one of the collectors.

I forgot how good Mass Effect 1 was, I really hope 3 ties up things nicely.

Sovereign was more important in terms of revealing the Reapers in their glory, but Harbinger did have some bad-ass villain lines. Kinda wish you had an exchange with him similar to Sovereign on Virmire, but hey, he was still pretty cool.

the whole ... actual main arc thing in ME2 was a bit shit really, wasn't it.

still can't believe the human reaper. just so, so dumb.

Sovereign used skill, Harbinger used Kinect.

@drag said:

the whole ... actual main arc thing in ME2 was a bit shit really, wasn't it.

still can't believe the human reaper. just so, so dumb.

How was it dumb?

Everything in ME1 pointed toward Reapers harvesting sentient life at the apex of their glory. For what possible purpose, I wonder? For food? They're machines. Why would they need food? Oh, for custodial staff, right? Well, no, because you see, they already have the indoctrinated for that shit. So what could they possibly be harvesting sentient beings for?

Connect the dots. I'll even lend you a crayola, so long as you promise not to eat it.

Harbinger is, in my opinion, the worst part of the Mass Effect series thus far.

I've been away from Mass Effect for so long that I barely remember either of them.

Sovereign's the better character, but so far as I remember, Harbinger hasn't been "killed" yet, and we haven't seen him in battle, so who knows. He may make up for it in sheer power.

@Three0neFive said:

Sovereign. Anyone who says otherwise has clearly huffed too much paint. Mass Effect 1: Mechanical space-gods who only allow life in the universe to exist so that they can harvest them. Takes an entire galactic coalition to destroy their paperboy.Mass Effect 2: Giant hungry spaceships, but they're lazy so they employ an army of space-bugs.Mass Effect 3: Evil spaceships of whom it takes an entire army to destroy a single planet. Entire army easily halted by Commender Broface McWomanizer - who spends more time trying to fuck his crew than actually fighting - and one of those Sarlaccs from the first game.

That was hilarious. Thank you.

The conversation with Sovereign in the original Mass Effect is one of the coolest things I've ever done in a video game. It was chilling. 
 
So, Sovereign.

Sovereign was awesome, the conversation you had with him and the entire Reaper reveal was amazing, also it took an entire armada to bring it? down.

Harbinger was more of a puppet master, who we unfortunately didn't really get to have more direct interaction with.

I'm just afraid that in Mass Effect 3, Shepard is going to take down Reaper after Reaper after Reaper, so they'll just be regular (boss)-fights, instead of an almost-god of destruction that Sovereign was.

So yeah, Sovereign was the best of the two. No contest.

The Climax to Mass Effect 1 was just so epic, the 2nd game was better overall, but comes no where near as close as the last 3 acts of ME1. I got chills the first time I played through it.

Sovereign by miles, shit was amazing.

When you say things such as "we are legion" and "I am the vanguard of your destruction" you win by default. But as it's also known now, reapers are not invincible. And I don't think there's ever been an implied idea that reapers have to be planet sized or be able to single handedly take down planets. As Sovereign says "our numbers will darken the sky of every world".

Man that Sovereign was awesomely quotable.

@Bam_D_Leprechaun said:

The Climax to Mass Effect 1 was just so epic, the 2nd game was better overall, but comes no where near as close as the last 3 acts of ME1. I got chills the first time I played through it.

Sovereign by miles, shit was amazing.

From a gameplay standpoint: Mass Effect < Mass Effect 2

But from a story standpoint: Mass Effect > Mass Effect 2

Mass Effect 2 lacked some truly memorable antagoinsts (Minus Tela Vasir), while Mass Effect had strong villains like Saren and Sovereign.

Welp, originally I didn't even realise Harbinger was a Reaper until after the Collectors died, but I suppose that's more down to the writing than the actual character.

@greenygrey: It really sucks though, I loved the hell out of ME1, but I had played it so much to get the S-rank that it no longer holds me like it did, same with ME2 (which i need to play though one more time to get ready for ME3)

Dragon Age: Origins doesn't have this problem with me because it felt like a better game (gameplay and storywise)

Sovereign.

Though we haven't seen much from Harbinger yet, so who knows. I honestly didn't even know he was a Reaper for the longest time. When Joker handed Shepard the datapad with him on it, I was like "who the hell is that?"

@Bam_D_Leprechaun said:

@greenygrey: It really sucks though, I loved the hell out of ME1, but I had played it so much to get the S-rank that it no longer holds me like it did, same with ME2 (which i need to play though one more time to get ready for ME3)

Dragon Age: Origins doesn't have this problem with me because it felt like a better game (gameplay and storywise)

That's the issue I had with both ME games. The story of Mass Effect was great, but the gameplay kind of sucked. While Mass Effect 2 had fun gameplay, the plot was piss poor compared to the original. It did have a great cast of characters however.

@KingWilly: did you not see that thing?

Sovereign humped the citadel till submission. Thinkaboutdat.

Meeting Sovereign on Virmire was one of the greatest video gaming moments ever. It sent chills up my spine for like 10 minutes straight. Saren and Sovereign are one of the main reasons why the ME1 story is so damn good - they are both some of the greatest video game villains around, and they're in the same game to boot.

Sovereign.
 
Harbinger never bothered me much, heck he annoyed me more than anything else in ME2.
His quotes are pretty good but you never hear them, besides the ASSUMING CONTROL and YOU WILL DIE SHEPARD.
Turns out he has entire speeches on each of your squadmate's races.

Harbinger was laughable, while Sovereign was a genuinely intimidating space-demon who delivered the most memorable moment with his introduction across the entire ME franchise thus far. If there is any merit towards Harbinger, it's that he's voiced by Keith Szarabajka.

Sovereign was cool, the problem was you confronted him twice in that entire game.

Harbinger was fine, but didn't have the speech. Most of this 'Harbinger sucks LOLZ' stuff is just the BioWare hate.

I especially love when people say their motivations are different. The only difference between them is Harbinger realizes he has to deal with Shepard. Not dealing with Shepard is what got Sovereign killed. So the first thing Harbinger does is nuke the Normandy. The second thing he does is try to get Shepard's body. That's a genre saavy villain.

@Brodehouse said:

Sovereign was cool, the problem was you confronted him twice in that entire game. Harbinger was fine, but didn't have the speech. Most of this 'Harbinger sucks LOLZ' stuff is just the BioWare hate. I especially love when people say their motivations are different. The only difference between them is Harbinger realizes he has to deal with Shepard. Not dealing with Shepard is what got Sovereign killed. So the first thing Harbinger does is nuke the Normandy. The second thing he does is try to get Shepard's body. That's a genre saavy villain.

Alright, allow me to clarify. His motivations after he killed Shepard is contrived. For a bunch of powerful race of machines, why did they waste their time to create an insect looking race, in order to kidnap colonists and liquify them in a slurpy machine of doom to create a giant Papa Schwarzenegger in space.

@greenygrey said:

@Brodehouse said:

Sovereign was cool, the problem was you confronted him twice in that entire game. Harbinger was fine, but didn't have the speech. Most of this 'Harbinger sucks LOLZ' stuff is just the BioWare hate. I especially love when people say their motivations are different. The only difference between them is Harbinger realizes he has to deal with Shepard. Not dealing with Shepard is what got Sovereign killed. So the first thing Harbinger does is nuke the Normandy. The second thing he does is try to get Shepard's body. That's a genre saavy villain.

Alright, allow me to clarify. His motivations after he killed Shepard is contrived. For a bunch of powerful race of machines, why did they waste their time to create an insect looking race, in order to kidnap colonists and liquify them in a slurpy machine of doom to create a giant Papa Schwarzenegger in space.

Because that's how they reproduce. Remember what Sovereign said? "We are nations unto ourselves." What do you think he meant?

They didn't 'just create' the Collectors, they repurporsed the indoctrinated Protheans to suit their needs millenia ago. Just like they did with the Keepers. They've probably done it a thousand times. And their needs were doing tests to discover the best candidate for being used to create a new Reaper. Turians, drell, krogan, quarians, all unsuitable.

Basically, the problem here is that people didn't pay attention and then got mad when they made shitty assumptions. Sounds like the Endurance Run.

Sovereign is definitely the more threatening of the two. You never actually saw Harbinger, just the Collectors that he was controlling. Harbinger never gave off the sense of dread that Sovereign did in Mass Effect 1.

@Brodehouse said:

Basically, the problem here is that people didn't pay attention and then got mad when they made shitty assumptions. Sounds like the Endurance Run.

Or Bioware just fucked up and sovereign was much cooler.

@greenygrey said:

@Brodehouse said:

Sovereign was cool, the problem was you confronted him twice in that entire game. Harbinger was fine, but didn't have the speech. Most of this 'Harbinger sucks LOLZ' stuff is just the BioWare hate. I especially love when people say their motivations are different. The only difference between them is Harbinger realizes he has to deal with Shepard. Not dealing with Shepard is what got Sovereign killed. So the first thing Harbinger does is nuke the Normandy. The second thing he does is try to get Shepard's body. That's a genre saavy villain.

Alright, allow me to clarify. His motivations after he killed Shepard is contrived. For a bunch of powerful race of machines, why did they waste their time to create an insect looking race, in order to kidnap colonists and liquify them in a slurpy machine of doom to create a giant Papa Schwarzenegger in space.

To not alert the Galaxy that the Reapers have returned because usually Sovereign deals with that shit but he fucked up, and maybe deep down in that mechanical shell the Reaper collective feel that the Galaxy they face this time could pose a threat to them. The Reapers whole strategy involves catching civilizations off-guard and we know that the Reapers are not as omnipotent as they claim as Sovereign was taken down albeit by a large fleet and with lots of causalities.

The Galactic counsel have proven this constant fatal ignorance time and time again by ignoring Shepard. The Harbinger was smarter than Sovereign, thinking ahead, killing their largest threat at the start and slowly picking off the Humans; a highly adaptable species as proven by their ability to excel using biotics, but a species that was politically isolated and not taken very seriously in Galactic issues as they were very new to it.

The Harbinger was faced with finding solutions to problems that had not existed before, Sovereign was much too arrogant in his species, his self proclaimed omnipotence became his downfall. Although he/it did know how to make one hell of a speech. (The insect looking race turned out to be the Protheans, which were used before to try and create a Prothean-Reaper but it failed miserably, they were then heavily modified over generations into the Collectors. A way for the Reapers to interact with the Galaxy without being found out)

Mass Effect 1: Mechanical space-gods who only allow life in the universe to exist so that they can harvest them. Takes an entire galactic coalition to destroy their paperboy.
Mass Effect 2: Giant hungry spaceships, but they're lazy so they employ an army of space-bugs.
Mass Effect 3: Evil spaceships of whom it takes an entire army to destroy a single planet. Entire army easily halted by Commender Broface McWomanizer - who spends more time trying to fuck his crew than actually fighting -  and one of those Sarlaccs from the first game.