Mass Effect universe discussion thread

[Ouroboros]

And don't forget that one of the evolved versions of her skill gives it a really short recharge time if she kills the target

As for characters I don't use, I don't like Jack much, mostly because of her personality. And with my current playthrough being a female Sheppard, I'm glad I decided to go the Sam Carter route on this combined playthrough (went as far down the Kaiden romance as I could before Virmire and killed him off, and planning on doing the same with Jacob and intentionally killing him in the suicide mission). His dialog in the romance is just so over the top.

The femshep and Jacob "romance" looks and sounds more like workplace sexual harassment than anything else. Some of the lines in the Miranda one are pretty bad to from what I've seen, and it's the path you need to take to earn yourself a gander at this...



The only romance plot I actually did was Jack's, but I want to do the Samara one with my Renegade shep so I can use the ending as his excuse for being a prick in ME 3.

[kharn the betrayer]

the romance dialogue in either game made me cringe... im not a particular fan of the first game at all though I found the characters for the most part more interesting than in the first game (only like Garrus and wrex in the first game)

I tried doing the Tali Romance with my Vanguard(this class is like crack on insanity mode...made the collector ship so easy outside the floating platforms) and ugh... no I dont like tali to begin with but here she sounds like a hormonal teenage girl with a crush..., I dont like How Jack needed a man to "save" her, and Miranda looks like Michael Jackson with boobs so not touching her either

any ways this is my "canon" Shepard


and this is his party after the suicide mission

[gotthammer]

no I dont like tali to begin with but here she sounds like a hormonal teenage girl with a crush..., I dont like How Jack needed a man to "save" her, and Miranda looks like Michael Jackson with boobs so not touching her either

On a Tali-related note: someone was asking Bioware, at the Dragon Age 2 sub-forum, to put Tali in Dragon Age 2. *le sigh*
Then again, I won't mind...as long as I get Morrigan as an LI companion in ME3.

[Ouroboros]

the romance dialogue in either game made me cringe... im not a particular fan of the first game at all though I found the characters for the most part more interesting than in the first game (only like Garrus and wrex in the first game)

Definitely, the characters in 2 were just much more varied and interesting overall and just generally more likable I found.

I tried doing the Tali Romance with my Vanguard(this class is like crack on insanity mode...made the collector ship so easy outside the floating platforms) and ugh... no I dont like tali to begin with but here she sounds like a hormonal teenage girl with a crush..., I dont like How Jack needed a man to "save" her, and Miranda looks like Michael Jackson with boobs so not touching her either

I just found out that apparently you can't get the Samara blueballs ending with a Renegade Shepard, she just indirectly threatens to kill you. Oh well, I guess I'll just leave this guy open for ME3.

All of the male Shepard romances at least either start out or turn out creepy and unsettling.

Tali: Like you said she acts like a worshipful teenage girl most of the time and the amount that she's apparently talking about you when you're not around is somewhat troubling. She is also so biologically incompatible with Shepard that being in the same room with him without her suit on could kill her. Yeah there's a long future ahead in this relationship. I'm sure there's no way this will inevitably eventually end up with Tali in the ground before her time, no absolutely no chance of Shep not quite being all the way over that last cold and her reacting to it like anthrax at the culmination of some romantic evening down the road. Somehow romancing Tali always felt more like taking advantage of her youthful stupidity to me.

Miranda: She spent years studying and reassembling your corpse piece by piece essentially enabling you to be "reborn" and well, lets just say old Sigmund would really love this one. Then there's the whole workplace sexual harassment angle again. "Wow the illusive man sure did assign me one sexy little subordinate, I wonder if she'll let me into her pants." She also may or may not have been planted to "keep and eye on you" and thus romancing you might just be all a big lie and part of her cover.

Jack: Takes damaged goods to a whole new level, and during the course of your courting her tells you how people that have tried to do so in the past and somehow hurt her feelings have been the victims of her homicidal wrath. Once she latches on to Shepard and makes this big emotional investment into him he's trapped forever. She'll turn into the female version of one of those movies about the obsessive boyfriend that won't leave the girl alone and murders anyone he thinks is at all interested in her. She also cries during her romance scene to cover the unsettling part.

Ashley might have been more normal from the first game but the way she so abruptly turns on you in this makes your Shepard keeping that little picture of her in his room just make him look pathetic.

[kharn the betrayer]

On a Tali-related note: someone was asking Bioware, at the Dragon Age 2 sub-forum, to put Tali in Dragon Age 2. *le sigh*
Then again, I won't mind...as long as I get Morrigan as an LI companion in ME3.

creepiest thing I ever saw over at the bioware forums was a home made ducktape tali sex doll god that was disturbing...

any ways I loved morrigan but not as a romance...then again Im gay so id prefer to romance another guy =3 (and if they put a gay interest in DA2 it better not be another elf)

edit:also what are your guys favorite/least favorite characters and classes?

Characters: Legion,Mordin,Garrus and Kasumi are mine though im liking Grunt more and more, least favorite characters... Tali, Miranda,Jacob, Thane

Classes>>>I really really Do not like the Soldier, Adept is a pain on higher difficulties and I play exclusivly on insanity, Vanguard and infiltrator are damn fun and im enjoying the engineer as well...havnt tried sentinal yet

[gotthammer]

Yeah. That 'doll' thingy was disturbing.

As for classes: oddly, I think I let my bro play the other classes...and I stuck w/ Soldier for both ME games, and through most playthroughs (I did try the engineer type one, I don't recall if I used a biotic class).

I like most of the characters. Mordin's an ME2 favourite, and Wrex for ME1. Tali's amusing/interesting, weird fans aside.
I think my least favourite was Jacob, I don't remember why.
Hmm...and maybe Liara for ME1. I didn't really like her. The other 2 females were kinda more interesting (Ash and Tali, tho' I don't think I liked the romance thingy for ME...didn't feel as well 'implemented'/written as DA:O's. ME1 had the better 'scenes', tho'...DA:O's was just...weird. )

[Ouroboros]

creepiest thing I ever saw over at the bioware forums was a home made ducktape tali sex doll god that was disturbing...

Oh god I've seen that to. So it wasn't just some horrible dream.

edit:also what are your guys favorite/least favorite characters and classes?

Characters: Legion,Mordin,Garrus and Kasumi are mine though im liking Grunt more and more, least favorite characters... Tali, Miranda,Jacob, Thane

Classes>>>I really really Do not like the Soldier, Adept is a pain on higher difficulties and I play exclusivly on insanity, Vanguard and infiltrator are damn fun and im enjoying the engineer as well...havnt tried sentinal yet

Favorite characters: Zaeed, Jack, Garrus, Grunt, Mordin, Samara. It should come as no surprise that this is also more or less my active character rotation for actual gameplay purposes.

Least favorite characters: Jacob, Miranda. Just seem dull to me.


Favorite class: Infiltrator with the widow rifle, or vanguard on insanity. Both of them offer lots of opportunities for intense action and there's probably nothing more satisfying in this entire game than a slo-mo widow headshot from under cloak. The only thing that can compare is counter-charging a Krogan and launching him across the room. Soldier can be fun to but you really need to take the revenant machinegun to get at a big part of that fun. Even on insanity that thing's a killing machine and just so much fun to use. That horde of husks at the end of the collector ship was made to be mowed down with the revenant. The name is also oh so appropriate for Shepard's signature weapon.

Least favorite class: Adept. Tried this once in ME2 and couldn't finish. Just way too slow going for me. Plinking away at defenses with the games puniest weapons so I'll eventually be able to pull off some sort of elaborate finisher does not make for a particularly fun time for me. It just seems that once you've got the enemy down to just his health you mind as well just keep shooting him rather than hit him with some fancy biotics that likely won't even kill him in one use anyway.

[Starsaber]

Only classes I've played in ME2 so far are Infiltrator (2 runs) and Vanguard (still in progress). Vanguard's interesting, and I think actually has a better skill set, but I think I prefer Infiltrator. I'm sure I'll find one that I like more than both of them.

And to steer the Tali talk back away from rather disturbing ground, here's a costume I saw at MegaCon this year.

[kharn the betrayer]

I think my least favourite was Jacob, I don't remember why.

because he talks like a 80's porn star whenever he opens his mouth? and happens to be boring as hell

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4ze_R3TevE


edit:also my Vanguard insanity playthrough...funnily enough the reaper IFF I found hell of alot harder than the collector ship... outside those damn platforms because charge kept glitching up...but once I was off those platforms I was running circles around the enemy...

the Husk swarms in the reaper IFF just ugh... good thing the boss is so damn easy with the cain...

also infiltrator is amazing...I just love head shotting enemies with the widow... or sneaking up on them with cloak and using a fully charged geth plasma shotgun blast point blank

[Stewart5]

creepiest thing I ever saw over at the bioware forums was a home made ducktape tali sex doll god that was disturbing...

any ways I loved morrigan but not as a romance...then again Im gay so id prefer to romance another guy =3 (and if they put a gay interest in DA2 it better not be another elf)

edit:also what are your guys favorite/least favorite characters and classes?

Characters: Legion,Mordin,Garrus and Kasumi are mine though im liking Grunt more and more, least favorite characters... Tali, Miranda,Jacob, Thane

Classes>>>I really really Do not like the Soldier, Adept is a pain on higher difficulties and I play exclusivly on insanity, Vanguard and infiltrator are damn fun and im enjoying the engineer as well...havnt tried sentinal yet

I love Soldier class. You are the simple, bog standard human in a Galaxy of super-powered aliens! It's the best way to experiance the game.
Adept was boring, Vanguard just felt like someone wanting the best bits of soldier and biotics etc. infiltrator was the only other class i could stand. Not tried sentinel or engineer yet.

And replying to an earlier most, my shore parties are thus

Most - Garrus, Zaed, Legion, Thane

Sometimes - Grunt, Miranda, Samara,

Rarely - Jacob, Jack, Tali, Mordin

(havn't got the other DLC character yet, too lazy)

Only classes I've played in ME2 so far are Infiltrator (2 runs) and Vanguard (still in progress). Vanguard's interesting, and I think actually has a better skill set, but I think I prefer Infiltrator. I'm sure I'll find one that I like more than both of them.

And to steer the Tali talk back away from rather disturbing ground, here's a costume I saw at MegaCon this year.

That is terrifying

[kharn the betrayer]

I love Soldier class. You are the simple, bog standard human in a Galaxy of super-powered aliens! It's the best way to experiance the game.
Adept was boring, Vanguard just felt like someone wanting the best bits of soldier and biotics etc. infiltrator was the only other class i could stand. Not tried sentinel or engineer yet.

I found soldier to be the most boring way to experience the game it was just so DULL and uninteresting and the class lacks anything interesting like the rush you get when playing a vanguard on insanity and learning how to and when to charge enemies without getting your self killed in 2.5 seconds

and even then if played right...damn you can clean house pretty fast (it also makes the geth collossus fight in talis recruitment easy as hell)

[gotthammer]

any of you watch the EA presentation that was streamed from Gamescom?
was actually was exciting for a few seconds when they said that they had an announcement for Mass Effect: turns out it's just ME2 for the PS3 (ok, maybe it is big for PS3 players...but I guess I was hoping for ME3 )

they also showed the first Dragon Age 2 trailer, it's up on the updated DA site: http://dragonage.bioware.com/

[Ouroboros]

I found soldier to be the most boring way to experience the game it was just so DULL and uninteresting and the class lacks anything interesting like the rush you get when playing a vanguard on insanity and learning how to and when to charge enemies without getting your self killed in 2.5 seconds

and even then if played right...damn you can clean house pretty fast (it also makes the geth collossus fight in talis recruitment easy as hell)

Soldier is the class to play when you want to just crush your enemies with raw firepower. I also agree with Garrowan5th that is has that certain charm of being just a regular human hard ass with no nifty special powers out dominating the galaxy. My canon Shep has been a soldier since ME1 for that reason.

As far as how the class plays you can do some amazing things with adrenaline rush. It's easily the most powerful singular ability in the game. Not only does it slow down time for you to line up shots or escape a bad situation but it gives a hidden 100% damage bonus in the hardened version and 140% in heightened. Hardened also comes with 50% damage reduction.

[kharn the betrayer]

the entire vanguard experiance is "blowing away enemies with raw firepower" though its entire gimmic is blasting enemies point blank range to the face with a shotgun and I found charging enemies hell of alot more fun and more rewarding than using adrenalin rush

also doesnt adrenaline rush count as a nifty special power? because time dilation, massive damage boost and reduction its not something a normal person has (now if the power was replaced with abilities like Kasumi's flashbang or Zaeeds Inferno grenades then I could agree with the whole "normal person" thing but as it stands those are bonus powers only

[Stewart5]

the entire vanguard experiance is "blowing away enemies with raw firepower" though its entire gimmic is blasting enemies point blank range to the face with a shotgun and I found charging enemies hell of alot more fun and more rewarding than using adrenalin rush

also doesnt adrenaline rush count as a nifty special power? because time dilation, massive damage boost and reduction its not something a normal person has (now if the power was replaced with abilities like Kasumi's flashbang or Zaeeds Inferno grenades then I could agree with the whole "normal person" thing but as it stands those are bonus powers only

I for one never used Adrenaline Rush (never found it that much of a boost) so I maintained the regular human charm. Biotics, pah!

[Ouroboros]

the entire vanguard experiance is "blowing away enemies with raw firepower" though its entire gimmic is blasting enemies point blank range to the face with a shotgun and I found charging enemies hell of alot more fun and more rewarding than using adrenalin rush

also doesnt adrenaline rush count as a nifty special power? because time dilation, massive damage boost and reduction its not something a normal person has (now if the power was replaced with abilities like Kasumi's flashbang or Zaeeds Inferno grenades then I could agree with the whole "normal person" thing but as it stands those are bonus powers only

The background material description of adrenaline rush is that it's the result of ME2 Shepard's new cybernetic implants giving him increased reaction times as I recall. In that sense you're right that he does become super human, but in ME 2 all Shepard's would be super human by default anyway. I'd also argue that AR feels less like "magic" than the misc biotic talents do. The fun in using AR comes from seeing how many guys you can headshot before it ends, or scoping right in on harbinger's big bloated dome with the vindicator, hitting the slow down button, and just going to town.

I'm not knocking the vanguard anyway, I like that class along with infiltrator and soldier. The only one I haven't enjoyed thus far has been adept and I've yet to try engineer or sentinel.

Sentinel I could see myself liking. The added armor would be nice on insanity, especially with shotguns as a bonus talent, and having overload, warp and cryo blast looks pretty nice with shep's cooldown bonuses.

The engineer looks a little less appealing judging by the talents and how much use I typically get out of legion and Tali.


I figure those two are probably the least played classes in general though so would be interested to hear if anyone has tried them and what they thought. My next playthrough will likely be as a sentinel.

[kharn the betrayer]

I prefer Legion over Tali, his widow sniper rifle is absolutely amazing more so since he almost always headshots with it shame you get him so late (unless you use the PC version and hack him into your party...which is actually worthwhile since he has so much cut dialogue)

im very early in my engineer playthrough, well kind of I got jack to recruit and then its onto horizen but its been fun, Mordin and grunt make great team members for it, use grunt to tank for you, but mordins cooldown times for his abilities are almost as low as shepards meaning you can strip the armor/shields/barriers(assuming you take area reave) off a group of enemies then immediately follow up with a full cyroblast to freeze them and since his cooldown times are almost(or exactly) as low as your you can spam that combo constantly

also Ai Hacking and Dominate on the same character can have some great results, but you might want to take area reave for fighting collectors so you can strip their barriers off and let mordin go to town with cyroblast


as for the sentinel I havnt used it but I can see it being great fun with the Geth plasma shotgun. load up your armor wade into enemy fire and blast them to bits with charged shotgun blasts

[Ouroboros]

I prefer Legion over Tali, his widow sniper rifle is absolutely amazing more so since he almost always headshots with it shame you get him so late (unless you use the PC version and hack him into your party...which is actually worthwhile since he has so much cut dialogue)

Looking at their skills and weapon options it's hard not to just see Legion as a superior Tali. I can't think of any other two characters where one just obsoletes the other like that except for maybe Grunt>Jacob, but Jacob has pull which at least lets him do something Grunt can't. Legion on the other hand has all the same skills as Tali, a better loyalty power, and a class skill that reduces his cooldowns as opposed to just increasing power duration like Tali's. He's already better just on those points but then you factor in that he's assault rifle/sniper for weapons compared to her pistol/shotgun and it's no contest, and then you factor in that he can get the widow...

They should have let Tali's class skill boost her shields or something to level things out a bit and pay homage to ME1, where she could be almost as good of a tank as Wrex if you built her the right way.


Anyway, I thought up something else we can do to keep the thread lively.

Favorite and least favorite recruitment and Loyalty missions.

Mine

Favorite

Recruitment: Samara: I'll admit this one remains my favorite largely because it's where you meet the "biotic god" and can either bop him on the head or encourage him to take on the Eclipse captain. It's got a nice progression from the initial crime scene atmosphere to the outdoor fight with the gunship, to the final battle with the red sand canisters flying all over the place. The enemies are challenging throughout but the mission lacks any real irritating single part like the right shutter in Garrus's mission or the boss fight at the end of Grunt's. Runner up: Mordin, mainly for the atmosphere, but it's a bit too short and easy and the final few rooms can be a pain in the ass for certain classes, namely those without decent long range punch.


Loyalty: Kasumi: I love the way this mission builds from a subtle clever infiltration to an all out massive gunfight against a boss gunship and hordes of goons at the end. The unique music is also really nice and Kasumi herself is a fun character to hang out with. The mission is unique also in that I think it's the only one in the game where you play the entire thing with only one other companion. Runner up: Mordin again, and again for the atmosphere and story behind it.

Least Favorite

Recruitment: Jack: I like the character but I hate this mission. I hate the YMIR mechs and how its possible for them to corner you with no cover, I hate the red lights, I hate the boss fight, I hate the repetitive rooms, I hate the stupid little walls that pop up out of the ground. Runner up: Grunt. the only reason you didn't win buddy is because your mission had better scenery. That bossfight at the end is something I dread in every playthrough, and that one downhill corridor with no cover that spawns multiple mercs when you're almost at the bottom is so hilariously cheap it has to be some sort of intentional joke.

Loyalty: Tali: You mean I get to actually play out one of those "trial" episodes every sci-fi show seems to have! YAY! Wait no, I mean, this was bad enough when I didn't have to actively work to advance the plot. Runner up: Thane: So I talk to a couple of people, follow a guy and that's it huh. Samara's mission didn't include any active combat either and managed to be fun, what went wrong.

[kharn the betrayer]

Actually Tali's loyalty power is really good at lv4 its overload but it heals your shields as well and does extra damage to geth and stuff, but I say its only really useful if your an adept or you play on insanity where 80% of the enemies you face have shields

but yeah I vastly prefer legion for the widow alone


any ways

Favorite recruitment:depends on the class actually, with Vanguard Tali's recruitment was just amazingly fun, I mean you can literally charge straight into the colossus when you reach it and kill it in 2 min flat and one time I ended up charging right into the spawning point of geth and and they kept respawning right in front of me...it was just great

otherwise I like Samara's alot as well for reasons you stated (also I AM THE BIOTIC GAWD)


Loyalty mission: Kasumi's for the same reasons you stated, its just a shame her loyaly outfit sucks IMO (then again thats what modded skins are for)

Least favorite:

Recruitment: hmmmm.... Legions I love the character but I hated the endless waves of husks thankfully you can OHKO the boss with the nuke launcher

Loyalty mission: Jacobs...I found thanes boring but Jacobs mission was beyond stupid....I mean it had gun using cave men that where made stupid via magical fruit somehow and the evil black man had enslaved the women into his personal harem...oh lord just thinking of that mission makes me want to headdesk

edit:have any of you taken LEGION to tali's loyalty mission? its hilarious thats the only reason i dont hate that loyalty mission

[Stewart5]

Favourites

Recruitment - Garrus
Mainly cause he's my favourite non-human, but also the idea of the lone hero standing against waves and waves of mercs for days on end is just awesome. A few moments in it were you wish that the loading screens after death didn't take so long, but still one of my favourites.
Runner-up - woulda loved Thanes, except the fact he used me as a distraction......yarg.....

Loyalty - Deffinately gotta be Zaed's. It's a proper dillemma. Made the other loyalty missions seem trivial
Runners-up Legion - I. Was. In. A. Geth. Space-station. Enuff said. Oh, and Tali's - on a planet where the sun was melting me, that was cool.

Least Favourites

Recruitment - I liked most of the recruitments, so this one's pretty hard.......though Grunts probably annoys me the most. Walking round that scrap heap fighting everything that moves (except one Krogan who for some reaosn deosn't want to smash you.....)
The fight at the end.....ridiculous...Krogan coming from all sides, a Heavy Mech AND a boss with a missile/grenade game-winner....COME ON!!


Loyalty - In total reverse, I hated most of these pointless time-vampires......but the winner is......EASILY Jacobs.......so, so pointless...had the makings of something good, but then failed....horribly.......
The only good thing about this mission is hearing the Rachni singing (if you saved 'em)
Runner-up - Jacks's, cause she's like a little emo from Glasgow, Thane's cause they horribly under-used his awesomeness, Grunt, cause, well, I don't like Grunt,


*note, How awesome was the bit where Thane preyed to the God of the hunt then vanished in a blink of an eye! That bit was epic, such a shame they didn't put it in an aweosme mission!