Zaal'Koris vas Qwib-Qwib

File:Admiral Zaal'Koris vas Qwib Qwib ME2 Before Alarei.jpg

Admiral Zaal'Koris vas Qwib Qwib is one of the members of the quarian Admiralty Board.

Zaal'Koris is voiced by Martin Jarvis.

Mass Effect 2

Zaal'Koris firmly opposes the idea of reclaiming the quarian homeworld, believing that the geth, being sentient, have as much right to live as the quarians, and advocates for the colonization of a new world instead. This has resulted in him being branded as a geth sympathizer. He is shown to be distrustful towards Rael'Zorah and his daughter, Tali. But Zaal'Koris later admits that he never hated Tali, he only thought her father's aim for war against the geth was wrong.

His home vessel is the Qwib-Qwib. If Shepard asks about the name of the ship despite Tali's warnings not to, Zaal'Koris haughtily explains that some of the ships in the Migrant Fleet are previously owned vessels from other cultures and that changing their registry information is not always possible. He does admit that a name like the Defrahnz or the Iktomi might have been better, but he is proud of the Qwib-Qwib and refuses to change ships because of petty teasing.

During Tali's hearing, Zaal'Koris will initially object to Commander Shepard's defense of Tali, saying that "a human has no business in such sensitive military matters". Shala'Raan will remind him that since he declared Tali crew of the Normandy, Shepard has the right to defend her. If Shepard brings Legion to Tali's trial, Koris will raise a different objection, demanding that quarian security remove the geth from the courtroom and accusing Tali of attempting to intimidate the admirals. Shala will then remind Koris that the captain of the Rayya, the ship on which the trial is taking place, permitted Legion on board and that Koris does not have the right to override a ship's captain on such a matter. In either situation, Zaal'Koris will withdraw his objection.

Mass Effect 3

Against Koris' objections, and Tali's if she is appointed as an admiral, the other admirals chose to attack the geth, which caused them to seek help from the Reapers. Koris' ship is shot down while destroying a geth planetary cannon, though he survived the crash. As he is fighting for his life, Shepard arrives to extract him. The Commander can either choose to obey Koris' plea to rescue his crew or convince him to come back to prevent the Civilian Fleet he commands from falling apart. If the latter is chosen, Koris would back up Shepard in making peace for both quarians and geth.

By 2186, Koris has been given command of the civilian fleets, so if Shepard does not rescue Koris but still makes sure the quarians survive the attack, some civilian fleet captains will panic and attempt to flee the system, but are cut down by geth in the attempt, reducing the "Quarian Civilian Fleet" War Asset.

If Koris was rescued, however, the "Quarian Civilian Fleet" War Asset remains unaffected and Koris himself is gained as a War Asset.

Trivia

• The name Qwib-Qwib may be a reference to Fred Saberhagen's Berserker series. They are autonomous self replicating spaceships (as are the Berserkers themselves) designed to fight the Berserkers. At the time of the novels only a single damaged Qwib-Qwib has survived.
• Martin Jarvis provides the voice for Avernus in the Warden's Keep DLC of Dragon Age: Origins, another BioWare game. Also, he is involved with voicing other characters in Star Wars: The Old Republic.
• Later in the conversation, Zaal'Koris says that not all quarians can serve aboard ships with great names such as the Defrahnz or Iktomi. However, according to quarian naming conventions, these ship names would be even more embarrassing to an English speaker - his name would be Zaal'Koris vas Defrahnz or Zaal'Koris vas Iktomi.