Mass Effect Multiplayer

For me role playing games have always been about the single player experience. I like to make my own choices and take things at my own pace. When I'm playing an MMORPG I usually don't feel like I'm playing a role but instead I'm just being myself. So when BioWare announced that Mass Effect 3 was going to have a multiplayer component I was quite disappointed. It felt like an attempt to bring in the Call of Duty demographic who I felt wouldn't appreciate the single player experience. I was also worried that it would water down the single player story. BioWare later promised that the multiplayer would be completely separate and would not affect the story campaign at all. Except that turned out to not be true. Every time I turn on the game the main menu tells me that galactic readiness is only 50% because I've not played any multiplayer matches. I'm led to believe that this has very little effect on the conclusion of the story but it still feels like I'm missing something. It's been years since I've played any online competitive FPS mainly because I simply don't have the time to keep playing and keep up practice. So there's always someone better than you and you don't really have a chance. Last night I decided I would have a quick go to at least see what it was all about and I was surprised to find it wasn't as bad as I expected it to be. Firstly it's not competitive, it's co-op verses AI which means you don't have to worry so much about the opponents skill level. The combat system is pretty much the same as the in the single player so that counts as practice. I played one random pick up game, it went well and the team won, even though I was a much lower level than the rest of the team who had obviously been playing for a while. Later the second team I tried to join wasn't as friendly though. They saw I was 15 levels below them and kicked me off the team. I couldn't find another free team at the time so I went back to the story. So while it was kinda fun it's not something I'm really interested in playing full time. There's one other problem. One of the great things about RPGs is the re-playability. I often go back and play old games and they're still fun. I've lost count of how many times I've played BioWare's Neverwinter Nights. However in 10 years time it's likely that there will be few people left playing the multiplayer component so how will we get to 100% galactic readiness at that point?