|
dwazegek posted:Like what? The only real insta-kills I know are the Atlas' (pick up target, crush) and Banshee's (pick up target and impale). All other attacks just do massive damage, but never enough to kill Shep in one hit (granted my vanguard had ridiculously high health and shields, with some added damage reduction from defense matrix). It was grenades I specifically had in mind, to be sure. I've seen many instances where a grenade has exploded next to a squadmate and not killed them. Hell, I've seen grenades explode at the feet of squaddies and not kill them. Sometimes not even take their shields down! But it could be a defect, I guess.
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 21:06
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 27, 2024 21:22 |
|
|
Ok this is starting to get to me now. Is there any way (short of turning squad power usage off) from using completely useless powers, i.e. Liara using Singularity 1 on turrets and phantoms when she has Warp and Stasis maxed? I don't want to spend half the game micro managing their powers because the AI is massively retarded.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 21:17
|
|
|
Hamburger Test posted:Ok this is starting to get to me now. Is there any way (short of turning squad power usage off) from using completely useless powers, i.e. Liara using Singularity 1 on turrets and phantoms when she has Warp and Stasis maxed? I don't want to spend half the game micro managing their powers because the AI is massively retarded. ...Don't leave singularity at 1?  It's insanely powerful especially on Liara. But if you insist, you can always just go to the medbay and respec your squadmembers. That should refund all points and allow you to just not put points in some powers.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 21:19
|
|
|
Oh man. As an adept: Assault rifle training: The Locust is basically a mini AR. I don't think I need this. Shotgun training: I don't really ever want to be near people, and I have Throw for that. Sniper rifle training: There's a non-zero chance I'll lapse into bad habits and just snipe all day every day. What do I do? 
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 21:19
|
|
|
Get the firepower pack and ar for the mattock,, the best gun in me2.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 21:23
|
|
|
I didn't get the Firepower pack entirely because it looked to have the best in slot weapons in ME2.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 21:24
|
|
|
Aristobulus posted:...Don't leave singularity at 1? It's completely useless on a lone turret, or that phantom I just saw her cast it on. It's not really that useful on stuff that it actually works on because I can nova them to hell and back. I don't have enough points left over (yet) from maxing Warp, Stasis and her passive. But yea, I was considering the respec option but I'm in mission at the moment - and it is really starting to annoy me.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 21:25
|
|
|
Elysiume posted:Oh man. As an adept: What role do you want the gun to fulfill? SR-wielding Adepts might use the Viper, for some additioal long-range defense stripping. AR wielding Adepts may benefit from the Mattock or Vindicator to supplement mid-range damage in the event you have a few moments where you aren't flinging talents around.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 21:26
|
|
|
magimix posted:What role do you want the gun to fulfill? SR-wielding Adepts might use the Viper, for some additioal long-range defense stripping. AR wielding Adepts may benefit from the Mattock or Vindicator to supplement mid-range damage in the event you have a few moments where you aren't flinging talents around. Time to never use my pistol ever again. I'll need to force myself to not play like a sniper.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 21:29
|
|
|
Elysiume posted:I'll probably just get the SR because the Locust is fairly good at mid range. I just think I'll end up entrenching myself alongside Garrus and Zaeed while we plink away at the entire enemy squad. So... Try not doing that, certainly :-) Its why I name-dropped the Viper in particular. If I use it, I don't use it for head-shot kills, I use it to supplement long-range defense stripping before I've moved into closer range. Edit: I guess its a 'horses for courses' thing, but I find using talents more interesting than using guns, so holding back to snipe whole squads away was never a temptation for me.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 21:31
|
|
|
magimix posted:They are way more durable in ME3. And not just due to improved behaviour (though it *is* greatly improved, I feel); I think Bioware accept that they can't code squadmates that can actually handle Insanity, so also made them way, way tougher than they are in ME2 (or just coded in some 'exceptions'). Squadmates can take attacks that'd insta-kill Shepard. I was surprised that my squad (Liara and Kaidan) were actually able to hold down a Banshee while I solo'd another one during the monastery mission, they're a lot tougher than in ME2. I don't recall ever seeing a single instant kill attack performed on anybody during my entire single player run though, and I was playing as a vanguard so I think I was extremely lucky that a Banshee never grabbed me. I will say that in addition to what dwazegek said I definitely think the Brute chokeslam and Phantom impale are also instant kills and not just heavy damage because they will put down a maxed out multiplayer krogan with one shot (plus the loading screen says that Brutes can instantly kill you).
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 22:37
|
|
|
Dr. Abysmal posted:I was surprised that my squad (Liara and Kaidan) were actually able to hold down a Banshee while I solo'd another one during the monastery mission, they're a lot tougher than in ME2. I don't recall ever seeing a single instant kill attack performed on anybody during my entire single player run though, and I was playing as a vanguard so I think I was extremely lucky that a Banshee never grabbed me. Hah, I had something similar in my Adept run. In the final Banshee/minion rushes of the Thanix portion of the end-game, I found myself trusting my two squaddies to take care of the Banshees while I took care of the minions. Not that I had a great deal of say in it, mind you; the Banshees where right behind me (in the same room, no less), while all the minions were advancing in front of me. Totally sandwiched. The whole time, I was bracing myself to get speared through the back.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 22:43
|
|
|
Dr. Abysmal posted:I was surprised that my squad (Liara and Kaidan) were actually able to hold down a Banshee while I solo'd another one during the monastery mission, they're a lot tougher than in ME2. I don't recall ever seeing a single instant kill attack performed on anybody during my entire single player run though, and I was playing as a vanguard so I think I was extremely lucky that a Banshee never grabbed me. I've definitely seen a Banshee pick up a squaddie, and I'm sure phantoms/brutes have got a few, but their animation is so fast it's easy to miss. I started a new game, not an import this time, and I didn't realize how much a difference starting at level 30 made. You can max out your major skill(s) + the passives pretty much right away at 30, so having to scrape and scrounge my way up makes a lot of the early fights much harder.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 22:49
|
|
|
Dr. Abysmal posted:I was surprised that my squad (Liara and Kaidan) were actually able to hold down a Banshee while I solo'd another one during the monastery mission, they're a lot tougher than in ME2. I don't recall ever seeing a single instant kill attack performed on anybody during my entire single player run though, and I was playing as a vanguard so I think I was extremely lucky that a Banshee never grabbed me. I couldn't get over how easy the game felt in comparison to earlier titles, especially considering how durable squadmates are. I don't think I ever used any medigel (wanted to save some of that sweet exp), and only rarely suffered from it. I kept thinking "Well, that was easy, I wonder how hard this will be on Insanity). And then I realized I was actually already playing on Insanity. Sure, I died a few times (mostly in the last few fights, partially since I brought awful squadmates), but overall I never really felt overwhelmed like I did for a few missions in ME2 and bits of ME1.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 22:51
|
|
|
I never felt overwhelmed, but I think Liara is worse than in previous games. She's always dying, it's so frustrating. Nobody else has died on me once, but Liara has died a number of times. She's just terrible so Javik easily took her place as my biotic companion.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:15
|
|
|
Crows Turn Off posted:I never felt overwhelmed, but I think Liara is worse than in previous games. She's always dying, it's so frustrating. Nobody else has died on me once, but Liara has died a number of times. She's just terrible so Javik easily took her place as my biotic companion. What difficulty are you playing on? I'm actually curious, because I'm terrible at the games so I use the easier difficulty so when I say "she was really useful for me" it really means essentially nothing because of that. That and I'd actually be interested to know if the squadmembers change in usefulness based on the difficulty. Liara's biotics are amazingly powerful and that'll stand out more on an easier difficulty where she won't be gibbed instantly all the time, for example. Whereas say, Garrus with a sniper rifle and his powers might not be great on a lower difficulty because he'll likely just sit back in cover, but it seems like it'd be a lot more useful on a higher diff. I'm just theorizing anyway, as I said I don't and haven't played on anything approaching a hard difficulty, so I'm asking people who have, if it changes things like that.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:20
|
|
|
Crows Turn Off posted:I never felt overwhelmed, but I think Liara is worse than in previous games. She's always dying, it's so frustrating. Nobody else has died on me once, but Liara has died a number of times. She's just terrible so Javik easily took her place as my biotic companion. Liara is essentially worthless in a universe where you can take Garrus and Anyone Else Who Isn't The Virmire Survivor in the same squad with Shepard.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:23
|
|
|
I dunno if we're still talking about ME2 Insanity runs, but I don't know what you guys are talking about with this "it being difficult at parts" thing. I always play as Soldier, and it's "Press 'Y' to activate AR, win game."
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:29
|
|
|
Hamburger Test posted:It's completely useless on a lone turret, or that phantom I just saw her cast it on. Charging Singularity is pretty awesome though, as I presume as long as your charge kills a target then you get a free combo explosion, huge damage.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:29
|
|
|
Aristobulus posted:What difficulty are you playing on? I'm actually curious, because I'm terrible at the games so I use the easier difficulty so when I say "she was really useful for me" it really means essentially nothing because of that. Liara has the lowest HP of all of the squad members so she is, by design, the most fragile one. On higher difficulties, enemies hit harder so it's tougher to keep her alive. I typically used Javik as my biotic squad member and Garrus as the other (since he has overload and is Garrus) but I pulled Liara out occasionally, I tried to use everybody at some point.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:30
|
|
|
I don't like seeing big red titles because I think it's mean and I like most of you guys. :[
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:30
|
|
|
Aristobulus posted:What difficulty are you playing on? I'm actually curious, because I'm terrible at the games so I use the easier difficulty so when I say "she was really useful for me" it really means essentially nothing because of that. fivegears4reverse posted:Liara is essentially worthless in a universe where you can take Garrus and Anyone Else Who Isn't The Virmire Survivor in the same squad with Shepard.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:32
|
|
|
Dr. Abysmal posted:Liara has the lowest HP of all of the squad members so she is, by design, the most fragile one. On higher difficulties, enemies hit harder so it's tougher to keep her alive. I typically used Javik as my biotic squad member and Garrus as the other (since he has overload and is Garrus) but I pulled Liara out occasionally, I tried to use everybody at some point. Right, I get that. Just, as a comparison, since I'm a wuss and only played on casual and occasionally normal, I literally never had Liara die until the fight against infinite Banshees in London So I was asking if there's like a tier of squadmember usefulness that shifts as you change difficulty. Because I only have the experience of one difficulty range, where she was pretty useful because her being fragile wasn't really an issue like it'd be at higher difficulties.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:32
|
|
|
The gently caress happened to your avatar/title. 
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:37
|
|
|
Crows Turn Off posted:Whatever the default is, so "Normal," I guess. The game is easy and nobody else dies except for her. EDI is actually one of the best squadmates in the game, since she takes the role of Mordin for TechSpam Bullshitter. Between her, Garrus, and an Infiltrator Shep, the standard difficulty was basically a bunch of enemy screams followed by explosions all the way until the end of the game. It made anything to do with Cerberus a lot funnier than it had any right to be. "SHEPARD- BLEEEAERERHRGHR!" "MAN DOWN, WE GOT WOUND- BRRERBELRBELERWRSD!" "IT'S SHEPARD, STOP- BWAAAAAAAHRGRHRRLRRGLJRG!"
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:37
|
|
|
Zedd posted:The gently caress happened to your avatar/title. Someone doesn't like Liara, obviously.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:38
|
|
|
Zedd posted:The gently caress happened to your avatar/title. No poo poo. I like to think I keep pretty up-to-date with the threads, and I don't recall a situation like that hapening.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:39
|
|
|
I'm playing on insanity and I can probably count the number of times any squadmate has gone down on one hand, and that includes liara I'm also playing as an adept though and with warp -> throw -> liara's stasis -> throw -> javik's dark channel -> throw -> warp -> cluster grenades detonation spam the average lifespan of enemies could best be measured by the time it takes certain subatomic particles to decay. edit: I guess it's only fair to mention I started with an import save and therefore with the massive boost of skillpoints it provides so a person coming right out of the box probably wouldn't have it quite as easy. Cowcaster fucked around with this message at 23:46 on Apr 2, 2012 |
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:40
|
|
|
Zedd posted:The gently caress happened to your avatar/title. Oxxidation bought me this one, same as he did the previous one, because he has some kind of a rage hard on for attacking me or something, idk ask him?  $20 he's spent on lazily insulting me though. If you want specifics on what happened? Here, in the ME3 spoiler thread: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3471712&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=635#post402182044 I post, it infuriates him, he shouts at me then buys me this title. fivegears4reverse posted:EDI is actually one of the best squadmates in the game, since she takes the role of Mordin for TechSpam Bullshitter. Between her, Garrus, and an Infiltrator Shep, the standard difficulty was basically a bunch of enemy screams followed by explosions all the way until the end of the game. It made anything to do with Cerberus a lot funnier than it had any right to be. This is exactly why Cerberus is the most fun enemy group to fight.  edit - "HOLY poo poo IT'S SHEPARD!"
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:41
|
|
|
Yeah personally I think your previous big red title was much more accurate anyway.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:42
|
|
|
Crows Turn Off posted:Hell, even EDI is useful if you want more tech than Garrus provides. Once properly specced, EDI's incinerate seemed to become an "instant-win" button. Targets that were stripped of their defenses would just cease existing upon deploying it. I actually really had a hard time choosing squadmates this time around because I felt everyone was worth bringing along. I usually went with a combination of Liara (despite her vulnerability), Garrus and EDI for most missions because they were the more interesting characters throughout the series (actually, I loathed Liara in ME1 but she really improved with LotSB and it seemed appropriate to bring her along in most missions for story purposes in ME3), but I always felt that I was missing out on something for not having any of the others with me. Guess I'll have to fix that in future playthroughs
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:43
|
|
|
I went with kaidan/liara mostly, with my shep as a vanguard. Reave, overload, warp, singularity, pull, charge, squad cryo ammo, the combinations are amazing. For the times without Kaidan I took either Garrus or EDI, for overloading goodness.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:43
|
|
|
Aristobulus posted:Right, I get that. Just, as a comparison, since I'm a wuss and only played on casual and occasionally normal, I literally never had Liara die until the fight against infinite Banshees in London She's still quite useful on insanity, she just may require a bit more babysitting to make sure she doesn't pick a dumb place to set up and get destroyed. I mostly went with Javik and Garrus because they are the coolest characters with the best dialog, since I was a vanguard I usually just killed everything myself anyway.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:44
|
|
|
All I really want out of an expansion/DLC ending is that we get more Cerberus dialogue/people to shoot, because it's hilariously satisfying to hear this 'well trained' group of Space Ninja-Stormtrooper hybrids just lose their poo poo within seconds of contact with Shepard and company. In fact, if they could apply this to the Geth and the Reapers in multiplayer, I might never stop playing it. "CONSENSUS: WE ARE hosed!"
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:45
|
|
|
Okay, I'm skipping ahead about 140 pages because there's no way I was going to catch up. Holy poo poo I can't believe how much crazier vanguards are this time around. I just finished Grissom Academy on insanity. On my first run as a soldier I had a really hard time with the atrium fight. As a vanguard I steamrolled Cerberus. I didn't even bother getting in the Atlas for the final fight. As soon as I discovered how amazing Nova is and stopped trying to play ME2-style, vanguard turned into easy mode. Always Be Charging has never been truer 
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:49
|
|
|
fivegears4reverse posted:All I really want out of an expansion/DLC ending is that we get more Cerberus dialogue/people to shoot, because it's hilariously satisfying to hear this 'well trained' group of Space Ninja-Stormtrooper hybrids just lose their poo poo within seconds of contact with Shepard and company. Oh man I'd be all over additional dialogue that made the Reapers and the Geth just completely panic facing Shepard and co. too. There's so much potential there, though I can't see how it'd apply to the Reapers, it definitely could apply to the Geth.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:49
|
|
|
My so far only playthrough used EDI and Liara pretty much exclusively, as they synergised well with my Vanguard. It generally went fine, aside from a few hiccups that were more about encounter design than squadmates being fragile.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:49
|
|
|
I didn't really pay that much attention to Cerberus in-combat dialog (although stuff like WE'VE GOT WOUNDED is burned into my brain thanks to multiplayer now) but I did like how the very first encounter you have with them goes from them thinking you are scientists putting up a fight and telling you to surrender, to realizing it's an Alliance squad, to realizing that it's Commander loving Shepard.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:52
|
|
|
Aristobulus posted:Oxxidation bought me this one, same as he did the previous one, because he has some kind of a rage hard on for attacking me or something, idk ask him? I didn't buy either of them. If I wanted to waste $10 I'd just flush it down the toilet. Maybe your posting's annoying more than one person? Hard concept to grasp, yeah, but you can do it. You've got hidden reserves.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:53
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 27, 2024 21:22 |
|
|
Aristobulus posted:Oh man I'd be all over additional dialogue that made the Reapers and the Geth just completely panic facing Shepard and co. too. There's so much potential there, though I can't see how it'd apply to the Reapers, it definitely could apply to the Geth. With the Reapers it'd be varying degrees of moans and roars of SHEPARD. Like a comedy version of Nemesis from Resident Evil 3.
|
|
#
?
Apr 2, 2012 23:56
|
|