Mwahaha, my plan worked.
I didn't use a guide or go back through the game to make different decisions than my first playthrough. I guess I just kind of lucked into/ naturally preferred the decisions that seemed to have a better outcome.
In fact that's a tiny bit of a lie - since I only had access to Mass Effect 2 and the backstory comic prior to the release of ME3, I knew nothing about the series or Bioware. The very first time I played ME2 I chose to save the civilians and not the council, and I chose to save Ashley instead of Kaidan. The reason I didn't choose Kaidan was because I naturally assumed that Ashley was the canon love interest (because fuck me never did I think games would mature to the point of actual M/M romances) and I felt like that was the choice I was supposed to make for some reason. I think I read something more into the comic than what was there.
When I played through the game I realised that destroying the council was a bad decision, but I didn't care enough about it really until I was almost finished the game. I also romanced Jack. Following my first playthrough I read a bit about ME3 before it came out, found out there were same sex romances in the game, and having watched some of the YouTube mods allowing for mShenko in ME1, replayed the whole thing in the hope that a male Shepard would be able to romance Kaidan when the game came out. This second playthrough (onward) was when I saved the council.
Of course about a year after that ME1 was finally released for PS3 so I did my "platinum runs" where I got the platinum in every game, and just played the trilogy from start to finish (3 completionist playthroughs and 3 semi playthroughs of ME1 back to back before I even got to 2, it gets super annoying quickly).
Other than that, the decisions I've made have never actually changed (other than to see some dialogue before a reload or whatever). ME isn't the kind of game series I'd use a guide for, the fresh experience you craft for yourself is what counts. Having said that, I wouldn't say it "breaks my heart" to see people using guides. People like Carlie simply don't care about spoilers or knowing what the best/ most favourable outcome is, and that's fine for them but not for others.
So yeah, I changed two major decisions after my initial playthrough. It wasn't due to a guide, more just how the story played out/ things characters said that made me change my mind about saving the council. If the first thing you start out with is the backstory comic, saving a random group of government people compared to thousands of civilians is a numbers game. Had I played the first game I'd have seen the whole thing from a completely different POV, but I had no frame of reference for who these people were or why they were so important. That comic is a very poor substitute for the first game. I don't know if any of you were actually in the same situation as me there, because I think most of you played the trilogy on PC or XBox, and those that played on PS3 did so after the first game became available on it.
The other decision was obviously saving Kaidan, and that's obviously the best decision I ever made (for me personally, as in, for the canon of the story that I wanted). I didn't even know he'd be a romance for a male shepard in ME3, and I spent most of the game thinking he wouldn't be because they'd introduced Cortez and what were the chances they'd include two? SUPER FUCKING GLAD! OTP!!!111!!one!
) and I have to make the grand beginning of getting everyone ready for war.
