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Whats your character build? cmdjing Send a noteboard - 05/02/2010 02:45:31 PM
What class are you playing as? A lot of people apparently think Mass Effect 2 = Mass Effect 1 and start up vanguards and adepts expecting them to rickroll only to find that they blow chunks at higher difficulties. That biotics except for warp will not affect barrier/shield/armor makes it near useless on higher difficulties when even husks are rocking armor.

Sentinel is definitely the best class this time around with great powers and extreme survivability. You've got overload for synthetic enemies and warp for armor/barrier wielding enemies. Bundle that with godly tech armor which doubles your shields, reduces your power cooldown, and gives you a knockback stun on it's destruction and you are rocking. Ammo is never a problem with me as using a gun on some fights is simply optional. Naturally I pick the assault rifle for my second weapon choice and armor piercing ammo for my bonus power. Warp power seems better, but I've found that barrier enemies are relatively rare, more importantly that the bonus damage to biotic affected enemies is rarely utilized because 1) pull is useless on insanity and 2) you don't want to be out of cover to take extra potshots and risk your shields going down. Lots of simply armored enemies though.

My preferred build is as follows.

Squad Armor Piercing Ammo 4
Guardian 4
Power Armor 4
Improved Warp 4
Overload 3
Throw 2

Basically on insanity, your squad is a big help and more than just a simple meat shield than on lower difficulties and the best team unfortunately doesn't come with their own ammo powers. I prefer using Miranda and Mordin for their powers and passive bonuses. Mordin is fairly resilient for his shield bonus and the squad damage bonus and warp/overload combo from Miranda cannot be dismissed. Not to mention both are packing SMG's which is a godly weapon (shotguns suck, which is why I never using anyone with simply a shotgun and pistol. I'm looking at you here Jack, Jacob, and Tali). Grunt and Legion may seem impressive with their tons of shielding/armor but their skills are definitely lacking. Not to mention I've found that companions rarely die later on on their own unless they do something stupid like get out of cover and when that happens the extra life won't protect them. I've found Garrus and Zaeed also useful since Garrus has Overload (pair him with Miranda on synthetic heavy missions for triple overload) and Zaeed has that nifty Grenade. Naturally both pack assault rifles.

Guardian for the slight bonus in HP and cool down reduction outweigh the bonus damage you get from Raider. Power Armor not only gives you an extra 25% shields but more importantly even more cool down reduction. Much better than assault armor as I generally tend to avoid having the tech armor go down as the cool down on recast takes too long.

I generally favor Heavy Warp over unstable Warp for your primary because of two things. One, unlike the squad version they have the same cool down (6 seconds) and two, the enemy is smart enough to spread out and I only occasionally catch more than one target per warp despite it's 5 meter radius. For squad mates with the power, unstable is the way to go for the 9 second instead of 12 cool down timer which compensates for the less damage and as a bonus you get a 7 meter radius.

Overload I leave at 3, even though I would love to take to 4 simply because Warp is a more useful power against a broader array of enemies. The problem is that you could take it to 4 if not for the annoying fact that you need Throw at 2 before you can take any points in Warp.

Throw I've found fairly situational in it's use and on some maps you can shove people off of bridges to their deaths. Mostly though I use it for one purpose and one purpose only, killing husks. The 3 second cool down combined with all your bonus reductions mean you can spam this skill quickly as soon as it hits. I've found that the husk armor goes down fairly quickly to direct fire, incinerate, and warp but their life takes more bullets to shave off than their armor. Throw is effective because the husks are so light and go flying and when fighting husk swarms my strategy is to have team mates use their skills and attacks to take down the armor only and then throw them. It's more efficient and saves ammo.

For weapon choices, I generally go with the vindicator battle rifle, carnifex hand cannon, and tempest smg. The battle rifle is superior to both the bonus collector assault rifle and geth pulse rifle in damage. If you look at the coalescedini file on the PC you can find the actual stats of the weapons that they don't show and the battle rifle does more than 3x the damage per bullet than the avenger assault rifle. The collectors rifle and geth pulse rifle do somewhere in between. Admittedly you get more ammo, but on insanity you want to spend as little time exposed out of cover as possible and want to maximize your damage during that time which makes the vindicator the best choice really at mid distances when you can pop off a 3 round burst head shot and get behind cover while your powers recharge. The tempest SMG as I mentioned earlier is godly and has surprisingly good accuracy fired in bursts. More importantly though, it does 40% more damage per bullet than the Avenger assault rifle and has a bigger clip. Also on my play throughs, it tends to be the first weapon I can maximally upgrade while the others are only at 3/5 upgrade condition. At close range, your weapons deal 2x damage than normal to enemies and it is a life saver when you are being swarmed by husks when you can just unload on them regardless of accuracy. The Carnifex hand cannon does around 80 damage per shot from what I can remember, the problem is that unfortunately it's ammo capacity is way reduced from what it should be. The total damage of bullets is actually less than the original heavy pistol which can be a problem in long fire fights. However, since you are mainly relying on your powers and other weapons, this isn't as much of a problem and the heavy damage per bullet and good accuracy lets it function as an ersatz sniper rifle and gives you more time to remain in cover.

Heh that reply went longer than I had anticipated. It probably deserves to be it's own topic.
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Why not? Let's have a Mass Effect thread. - 02/02/2010 05:02:32 PM 3608 Views
Character discussion: Mordin Solus - 02/02/2010 06:28:41 PM 1847 Views
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I think your friend may be correct. - 02/02/2010 08:41:41 PM 1247 Views
I am the very model of a Scientist Salarian. - 03/02/2010 11:15:05 PM 1445 Views
Oh that was wonderful. - 03/02/2010 11:29:39 PM 1157 Views
I'll be back - 02/02/2010 08:07:28 PM 1245 Views
No problem. - 02/02/2010 08:18:48 PM 1204 Views
The Illusive man - 02/02/2010 08:34:09 PM 1473 Views
I didn't even realize that's who he was. - 02/02/2010 08:44:07 PM 1400 Views
"I'm having trouble hearing you. I'm getting a lot of bullshit on this line." *NM* - 02/02/2010 09:34:53 PM 687 Views
And other famous voices too... - 13/02/2010 02:41:38 PM 1319 Views
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I wish i had realized Tali was an option - 02/02/2010 11:26:15 PM 1300 Views
The story of Matt-Shep and his many women. - 03/02/2010 04:44:57 AM 1340 Views
Re: The story of Matt-Shep and his many women. - 03/02/2010 05:40:12 PM 1204 Views
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Does she take the helmet off? *NM* - 04/02/2010 07:57:18 PM 714 Views
Answer: - 04/02/2010 08:26:38 PM 1220 Views
Re: Answer: - 04/02/2010 10:43:09 PM 1225 Views
Re: Answer: - 05/02/2010 12:48:04 AM 1232 Views
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Which reminds me that I always wondered... - 07/02/2010 11:54:14 AM 1318 Views
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Morinth might be into that - 15/02/2010 06:41:12 AM 1350 Views
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On limited resources... - 03/02/2010 04:33:10 PM 1263 Views
I think it adds depth to the combat, reduces "pew-pew" spam. - 03/02/2010 04:43:04 PM 1330 Views
I just want to be part of this....that said, Best Buy is no longer selling ME:1 - 02/02/2010 11:16:51 PM 1398 Views
Could well be. - 03/02/2010 04:52:49 AM 1152 Views
Re: Could well be. - 03/02/2010 05:56:52 AM 1190 Views
Yeah. Blech. - 03/02/2010 06:04:35 AM 1297 Views
Yeah, the only decent deals I've found there - 03/02/2010 07:59:23 AM 1264 Views
I don't know why.... - 03/02/2010 08:14:50 AM 1223 Views
Glad the PC version was $50, at the risk of sounding like a snob. - 03/02/2010 04:01:52 PM 1196 Views
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I agree with you, and am enjoying the Vanguard so far. - 03/02/2010 02:33:06 AM 1226 Views
My thoughts, crippled by not having played the game - 03/02/2010 04:52:26 AM 1470 Views
From someone with the same dislike of FPS's - Spoiler Free - 16/02/2010 10:44:42 PM 1237 Views
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Re: The "Holy crap that was awesome" moments. SPOILERS - 04/02/2010 04:11:23 AM 1174 Views
Re: The "Holy crap that was awesome" moments. SPOILERS - 04/02/2010 04:59:54 AM 1227 Views
Re: The "Holy crap that was awesome" moments. SPOILERS - 04/02/2010 06:16:29 AM 1331 Views
Well. . .somewhat, I guess. - 04/02/2010 06:43:02 AM 1353 Views
Re: Well. . .somewhat, I guess. - 04/02/2010 03:32:26 PM 1290 Views
You know what? I'll actually buy that. I appreciate the explanation. - 04/02/2010 06:30:37 PM 1109 Views
A couple of more things...... - 16/02/2010 12:41:19 AM 1347 Views
Some good thoughts. - 16/02/2010 01:50:07 AM 1293 Views
Re: Some good thoughts. - 16/02/2010 06:54:59 PM 1170 Views
Re: Well. . .somewhat, I guess. - 04/02/2010 10:42:11 PM 1263 Views
Mine - 13/02/2010 02:46:41 PM 1221 Views
Yuss! - 22/02/2010 08:08:41 PM 1251 Views
Game was too easy, primary plotline too short - 04/02/2010 09:03:52 PM 1280 Views
Nice. I'm playing through on Insanity now, and I think it's a good challenge. - 05/02/2010 02:17:02 AM 1187 Views
Whats your character build? - 05/02/2010 02:45:31 PM 1447 Views
You put a lot of thought into that. - 05/02/2010 03:58:16 PM 1388 Views
Re: You put a lot of thought into that. - 05/02/2010 04:00:26 PM 1348 Views
The game was too easy - 13/02/2010 02:48:10 PM 1158 Views
A moment that made me laugh pretty hard. - 05/02/2010 01:06:47 AM 1320 Views
LOL yeah *NM* - 22/02/2010 08:11:30 PM 693 Views
Ok, so male or female Shepherd? - 05/02/2010 01:50:23 AM 1211 Views
Hm. This brings up a thought. - 05/02/2010 01:52:37 AM 1153 Views
Not Moridin or Grunt - 05/02/2010 02:08:49 AM 1207 Views
Dam, I really wanted to bed Mordin (Only one "i" there) *NM* - 05/02/2010 02:46:19 AM 660 Views
Male for my first playthrough, female for my second. - 05/02/2010 02:28:24 AM 1310 Views
Agreed, on some of those counts. - 05/02/2010 07:28:00 AM 1167 Views
Re: Agreed, on some of those counts. - 05/02/2010 07:43:20 AM 1312 Views
Yeah - 13/02/2010 02:51:44 PM 1304 Views
Male so far. I plan on playing the female Shepard next playthrough. *NM* - 05/02/2010 03:25:00 AM 734 Views
I think I'll do fem on my third playthrough. - 05/02/2010 03:33:56 AM 1214 Views
Your Teams, and Your Deaths. - 07/02/2010 06:30:25 AM 1136 Views
Re: Your Teams, and Your Deaths. - 07/02/2010 09:07:17 AM 1323 Views
Hm, that's interesting. - 07/02/2010 03:31:52 PM 1229 Views
Do you know... - 07/02/2010 03:46:59 PM 1142 Views
Re: Do you know... - 07/02/2010 04:31:29 PM 1220 Views
Awesome. Thanks! *NM* - 07/02/2010 04:40:59 PM 716 Views
Yeah, that's what I did. - 07/02/2010 06:37:50 PM 1093 Views
Re: Yeah, that's what I did. - 08/02/2010 03:44:52 PM 1094 Views
Hmmm... - 09/02/2010 03:48:48 PM 1170 Views
Strange. - 09/02/2010 04:19:04 PM 1214 Views
me too - 13/02/2010 03:01:05 PM 1210 Views
Did you do Legion's loyalty mission? - 15/02/2010 05:52:36 AM 1307 Views
I did, for what it's worth. - 15/02/2010 07:26:38 AM 1234 Views
Gah. Then I wonder if loyalty of the rest of the crew has something to do with it. - 15/02/2010 04:20:13 PM 1200 Views
That could definitely be the case. - 15/02/2010 04:30:06 PM 1185 Views
Maybe Joker flew slowly. - 09/02/2010 04:22:38 PM 1210 Views
Re: Your Teams, and Your Deaths. - 07/02/2010 03:42:05 PM 1203 Views
Yea, I had one hull upgrade left before going in - 07/02/2010 03:49:57 PM 1086 Views
Re: Your Teams, and Your Deaths. - 13/02/2010 02:55:48 PM 1247 Views
My first time through and all squad members survived. - 16/02/2010 03:09:46 AM 1262 Views
Re: Your Teams, and Your Deaths. - 19/02/2010 10:16:28 PM 1182 Views
I didn't see that one coming - 22/02/2010 08:16:33 PM 1249 Views
Re: I didn't see that one coming - 23/02/2010 03:29:57 AM 1218 Views
Re: I didn't see that one coming - 24/02/2010 10:23:03 AM 1179 Views
I have come across a big problem. - 07/02/2010 06:53:36 PM 1249 Views
Re: I have come across a big problem. - 08/02/2010 03:41:16 PM 1177 Views
Adept seems rather fun... - 08/02/2010 03:49:23 PM 1131 Views
Want FREE Mass Effect 2 DLC? ME 2! (har, har) Bioware bonus goodies detailed inside. - 09/02/2010 07:03:23 PM 1364 Views
Now if only the DLC armors didn't have helmets. - 09/02/2010 07:26:47 PM 1153 Views
I did that for about half the game - 09/02/2010 07:48:14 PM 1178 Views
At first I was wearing the visor - 09/02/2010 11:32:28 PM 1266 Views
Of course, the Shotgun is released AFTER I beat my Vanguard *sigh* - 09/02/2010 11:31:13 PM 1227 Views
It's nice, but you don't miss much if you already had the Claymore shotty w/ an ammo upgrade. *NM* - 10/02/2010 05:16:00 AM 666 Views
I couldn't stand the Claymore - 10/02/2010 05:20:42 AM 1211 Views
Anyone find anything interesting about Zaeed Massani? - 11/02/2010 09:08:16 PM 1244 Views
I enjoy Zaeed. - 11/02/2010 09:22:39 PM 1198 Views
Yeah, I've listened to him alot but it's the same stuff every time. - 12/02/2010 03:14:11 PM 1155 Views
Never put him on my team once. And in the same vein - Jack. - 12/02/2010 01:34:33 AM 1301 Views
Who, what, where? *NM* - 22/02/2010 08:18:31 PM 626 Views
If you bought a new copy of the game, it came with a code for the "Cerberus Network" - 22/02/2010 08:22:18 PM 1160 Views
Oh, I did - 22/02/2010 08:30:21 PM 1141 Views
Is there a way to install the game on the Xbox, so you don't have to switch discs? - 12/02/2010 01:39:07 AM 1190 Views
Good ones have two discs, of course. DVDs can only hold so much. *NM* - 12/02/2010 02:46:39 AM 622 Views
This is the first I've ever seen. *NM* - 12/02/2010 02:51:34 AM 656 Views
I've never understood why people are unhappy with the multiple discs. - 12/02/2010 04:18:42 AM 1194 Views
There are a few others. - 12/02/2010 06:52:01 AM 1130 Views
Since nobody has really answered you....YES - 16/02/2010 10:08:40 PM 1203 Views
Shadow answered him. *NM* - 16/02/2010 10:52:17 PM 665 Views
So far, so great! - 12/02/2010 08:35:00 AM 1166 Views
Re: So far, so great! - 12/02/2010 02:31:43 PM 1274 Views
Re: So far, so great! - 16/02/2010 10:17:12 PM 1223 Views
I love the detail put into this game. - 12/02/2010 02:58:35 PM 1148 Views
Female Turians.... - 12/02/2010 09:05:39 PM 1126 Views
Nope. Don't exist in-game. - 14/02/2010 01:47:23 AM 1093 Views
I believe a krogan female is shown once. - 14/02/2010 02:03:27 AM 1180 Views
No I don't think that's right. - 14/02/2010 08:54:32 AM 1106 Views
Two things make me feel that the ambassador is female. - 14/02/2010 02:50:18 PM 1164 Views
So I just revisited Tuchanka... - 14/02/2010 05:21:39 PM 1273 Views
Asari - 15/02/2010 06:51:10 AM 1235 Views
Not really. - 15/02/2010 10:41:54 PM 1157 Views
I think you're taking him too literally. - 16/02/2010 01:06:11 AM 1156 Views
Yeah, probably was. - 16/02/2010 03:26:46 AM 1219 Views
Yeah, that's what I meant - 16/02/2010 10:51:01 PM 1193 Views
Dammit! I lost Miranda! - 14/02/2010 08:24:55 PM 1184 Views
The final verdict - 22/02/2010 08:06:12 PM 1197 Views
Re: The final verdict - 22/02/2010 09:01:53 PM 1204 Views
Explanation for death - 23/02/2010 02:00:16 AM 1199 Views
Can't be it, then - 23/02/2010 08:02:11 AM 1308 Views
He got taken by the bugs during the biotic bubble sequence? - 23/02/2010 03:25:36 AM 1176 Views
Re: He got taken by the bugs during the biotic bubble sequence? - 23/02/2010 08:03:46 AM 1227 Views
By the way, my game was surprisingly buggy - 23/02/2010 08:49:28 AM 1289 Views
Huh, I never got that. I only got one kind of bug. - 23/02/2010 04:06:17 PM 1118 Views
Re: Huh, I never got that. I only got one kind of bug. - 23/02/2010 04:29:46 PM 1146 Views
I had no bugs of any sort. *NM* - 23/02/2010 05:15:32 PM 676 Views
A complaint about the Morality system. (Or, how Mass Effect semi-killed roleplaying). - 27/02/2010 06:40:35 AM 1289 Views
Re: A complaint about the Morality system. (Or, how Mass Effect semi-killed roleplaying). - 27/02/2010 12:28:29 PM 1123 Views
Re: A complaint about the Morality system. (Or, how Mass Effect semi-killed roleplaying). - 27/02/2010 04:57:43 PM 1178 Views
Re: A complaint about the Morality system. (Or, how Mass Effect semi-killed roleplaying). - 28/02/2010 12:34:31 AM 1226 Views
I suppose. - 28/02/2010 03:29:23 AM 1207 Views
A vital part of role-playing is forcing the player to deal with the consequences of their actions - 27/02/2010 11:53:56 PM 1458 Views
Admittedly, my post was somewhat stream-of-consciousness. - 28/02/2010 03:28:02 AM 1151 Views
That's more understandable. - 28/02/2010 05:58:59 AM 1169 Views
Yeah, the tradeoff already works just fine. - 28/02/2010 06:05:44 AM 1178 Views
ok that's weird - 10/03/2010 06:52:39 PM 1197 Views

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