# Fight for the Lost - The Mass Effect 2 Thread



## horacethegrey (Jan 28, 2010)

Well, it's been 2 years since Sovereign made us pee in our pants. So after all that time, has Bioware come through with flying colors on the invetable sequel to their outer space saga? 

The answer is a resounding YES. 

There's just too much praise here that I can hardly fill in one post. Whether it's the vastly improved (and HARD! ) combat system, the genuinely thrilling and varied mission based structure, the new NPC companions who are far more interesting than their predecessors (despite some returning ones), the vastly superior graphics... hell I could go on and on. I'll just stop here and say that the game improves upon everything the original was.

Mass Effect 2 is available on Xbox 360 and PC my friends. Get it , play it, love it.


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## Thanee (Jan 29, 2010)

Yep. One of the definite must-haves this year. 

Bye
Thanee


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## fba827 (Jan 29, 2010)

I never played ME1 because I don't like shooters AND I'm bad at them (and while it's an RPG, the combat system is a shooter).

Due to my opinion of Dragon Age: Origins (made by the same people), I am borrowing ME2 from someone in a couple weeks (after he's played it to death  ).

I'm hoping the "easy" mode will be easy enough for my skill-less self and that the story will be enjoyable enough as a stand alone (i.e. without ME1 foreknowledge, though I did see "IGN's 5-minute recap of ME1's story to get ready for ME2" (or whatever it was called).


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## stonegod (Jan 29, 2010)

After just playing ME1, I appreciate all the subtle nods to it in ME2 (overheard conversations, news items, a few random non-quest NPCs).


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## Felon (Jan 29, 2010)

I think Metacritic put it well: "Game of Year in January?"

Assembling a dirty-dozen-style team for an impossible mission is, IMO, the most engaging hook to hang an RPG on (tabletop or video game). You don't have to know each other well, and some you won't even like each other, but there's an impossible job to do and you each bring something important to the team.

Since I have some fellow players here, lemme ask some (spoiler-free) questions:

1) In your experiences, how does the aggro seem to be distributed between Shepard and the rest of the team? I have been running into a nasty situation where every enemy seems to concentrate fire on me, ignoring my teammates even when they're closer and moer exposed. Since I'm an infiltrator, that's a problem. I need to use my teammates as meat shields so I can snipe. The tactical cloak breaks the aggro (which actually makes the issue noticable), but the cloack's cooldown and duration are not optimized for consistent usage.

2) Anyone figured out how to make the amount of money you seem to need to be able to make to afford gear and upgrades? I'm still pretty early in the game, but I haven't found any way to make money. There are no loot drops to sell, and the resources I'm gathering from planets don't seem to be sellable either. Maybe something will change later in the game, but right now I'm full of palladium and have no way to sell it.

3) Has anyone gotten to the second disc yet? My biggest concern right now is that the game will turn out to be much shorter than I expect. With ME1, it didn't sink in for me that getting Shepard promoted to spectre is actually the middle of the story, not the beginning (with only three more major missions left over IIRC). Since we (supposedly) have a good amount of DLC coming out, I don't want to crush it over the weekend. With stuff like Risen, FFXIII, and Red Dead on the way, a second playthrough seems unlikely.

May want to spoiler-tag any answers.


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## Enforcer (Jan 30, 2010)

I've had to use the 2nd disc, but I don't feel that I'm very far in (level 15). I think that some locations are just on the 2nd disc.

Money hasn't been much of an issue for me, but I imported my level 50 guy from ME 1, which gave me a substantial credits and resources bonus. A level 60 port is supposed to provide even more, as does having the "Rich" achievement from the first game. Completing missions for the organization (you know which one I'm talking about, but I don't want to spoil for those who haven't played it yet) seems to pay the best, credit wise, as they fund the missions. Also, make sure you're hacking wall safes and PDAs, they often have a couple grand in credits on 'em.


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## Thanee (Jan 31, 2010)

Felon said:


> I think Metacritic put it well: "Game of Year in January?"




Heh. 

Well, we'll see... there are some big names coming out this year, like StarCraft II.1 or Crysis II. So there is, at least, some competition. 



> With stuff like Risen, ... on the way, ...




Risen is only "on the way"? It came out in early october around here (with english language, too). Guess it takes some time to distribute...

Bye
Thanee


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## Felon (Feb 1, 2010)

Yeah, Risen is delayed. From what I hear, the Xbox version was a huge mess, so maybe they'll have cleaned it up.

I actually did load up from a level 50 character who had the Rich achievement, so I got a nice cash bonus. But I'm still stretched very thin. As of this point, it looks like money is gained in little dribs and drabs by the occasional looting of some box or wall safe.

I've gotten to the second disk. Supposedly, you're not supposed to have to constantly switch back and forth. There's a point where you put in the second disk, and then eventually you swap back. My main concern is that once you have the team assembled, that's it for the primary missions. Wrap up whatever side quests are left over and get your butt to that point-of-no-return that leads you straight into the finale.

Btw, what classes are you guys playing? I've taken up my infiltrator class from ME1. It's FAR more viable now. Indeed, I can scarcely imagine life without a sniper rifle.


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## horacethegrey (Feb 1, 2010)

Felon said:


> Btw, what classes are you guys playing? I've taken up my infiltrator class from ME1. It's FAR more viable now. Indeed, I can scarcely imagine life without a sniper rifle.



I imported John Shepard, my Soldier, from the first game. And it's pretty sweet to use all those different guns  (though I mostly used the assault and sniper rifles ). Finished the game with him (the finale is AWESOME btw). I'm now currently playing with Laura Shepard, my imported female Vanguard. And it's just awesome what Bioware did with that class. The Biotic Charge is my new favorite power. 

Oh, may I just add that Jennifer Hale is the best voice actress I've heard in a game? Seriously, while she was good in the ME1 as the female Shepard, she just kicks so much ass in ME2. No offense to Mark Meer (who I think does okay as the Male Shepard), but Hale's delivery just knocks it out of the park every time. The female Shepard just sounds more threatening, more dignified, and definitely more flirty.  Excellent work. Really hope she returns in the third installment.


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## Felon (Feb 1, 2010)

Yes, I was eyeballing the vanguard class with some appetite. Though they all look good, I do want to get into a class that excels at close combat once I'm done with my infiltrator. 

The male Shepard's voice lacks inflection. In a sense, it's a relief to have a character whose badassitude is somewhat understated (in contrast to all of the over-the-top butt-kickers out there in gameland), especially since it allows his teammate's personalities to shine. OTOH, he can seem lukewarm at times. Still, "you're working too hard" only works with a deadpan delivery (those who've gotten that far in the game oughta know what I'm talkin' about).



horacethegrey said:


> Finished the game with him (the finale is AWESOME btw).



Finished already, huh? How would you rate the length of the main story? Did you clock at least 50 hours?


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## stonegod (Feb 1, 2010)

Biotics has been rejiggered since ME1 (no more "Lift" and we win button), but the new combos are pretty sweet and make it fun.


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## horacethegrey (Feb 2, 2010)

Felon said:


> Yes, I was eyeballing the vanguard class with some appetite. Though they all look good, I do want to get into a class that excels at close combat once I'm done with my infiltrator.




Be careful with it though. While the Vanguard does excel in close quarters, it can backfire spectacularly if you don't plan your strikes well. Say you pull a biotic charge on one opponent, only to find yourself open to his buddies' fire once you're out of cover.

Back to the subject of voice acting. As I said before, Mark Meer does a good enough job as the Male Shepard, and he does shine in a those few moments where we see how much of a badass Shepard is. But still, it pales in comparison to Jennifer Hale's spectacular turn. I don't think I've been impressed by a performance like this in a video game since... well, ever.

As for the length, well I didn't realy time myself. But I'm guessing 40 to 50 hours. Give or take.


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## wolff96 (Feb 3, 2010)

I think there's only one problem with the game:  They took out the MAKO because some people didn't like the controls and added Scanning.

The planetary scanning has to be *the* most boring sub-system I have ever come across.  Yeah, you can skip most of it if you think you have enough resources...  but WOW.  For a completionist like me, it's just brutal.  SO BORING.

Um, guys?  We have a computer aboard for a reason.  They don't get bored on routine tasks!  Why is the *player* handling the scanning??

Other than that one -- to me, MADDENING -- flaw, I really love ME2 and think they knocked it out of the park.  The voice acting is wonderful, some of the quests are spectacular, and the conversations are great.  I also like that the characters feel darkier and edgier without (for me, anyway) going over the line to ridiculous.  

Bottom line?  I can't wait for part 3!


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## Felon (Feb 4, 2010)

wolff96 said:


> I think there's only one problem with the game:  They took out the MAKO because some people didn't like the controls and added Scanning.
> 
> The planetary scanning has to be *the* most boring sub-system I have ever come across.  Yeah, you can skip most of it if you think you have enough resources...  but WOW.  For a completionist like me, it's just brutal.  SO BORING.
> 
> Um, guys?  We have a computer aboard for a reason.  They don't get bored on routine tasks!  Why is the *player* handling the scanning??



We have plenty of evidence that in the future you will need humans to prime computers to perform tasks. 

Reminds me of a couple of times Stargate SG-1 took a shot at Star Trek.

Danielle Jackson (at the helm of the Prometheus): "OK, I guess you should prepare to fire on my command."

Weapons Officer: "For the record, I'm always prepared to fire. I just have to push this button here."

Seriously though, they're trying to make it a mingame, and with the millions of people out there playing Farmville and Mafia Wars, I gotta say that the threshhold for monotonous utterly repetitive games seems to be pretty high. I think the big problem with the scanning is that there needs to be more of a slot machine feel to it. You need to discover a little more variety of stuff, like you do when you're playing Civilization. If you could occasionally discover some collectable, it would be a lot more addictive (kinda like doing jobs in Mafia Wars, I suppose).


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## stonegod (Feb 5, 2010)

Finished my first playthrough. Grand, a bit surprising, and a bit sad.[sblock=Spoilers Ahoy! I Mean It!]Upgraded the Normandy and did everyone's loyalty missions. My Paragon FemShep had a relationship with Liara in ME1 and (1) wasn't interested in Thrane, (2) thought of Jacob as a bud, and (3) saw  Garrus as a protegé so not going there! Thus, no romance, just a scene of looking at L's picture wistfully.

Survived the O-4 Relay, watched Chambers get juiced by the Collectors, and for some reason I cannot fathom lost Mollus when he defended the back door with everyone I didn't take to fight the BBBBEG. Got to figure that out so I get me an achievement![/sblock]Now for round two! Renegade, here I come!


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## renau1g (Feb 5, 2010)

One thing I've noticed is the PbP boards got a lot quieter since this came out... and with Bioshock 2 soon (next week right?) don't expect it to get better soon...hoping to pick it up in a couple months when Christmas stuff's all paid off.


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## fba827 (Feb 5, 2010)

okay so i'm borrowing this game from my cousin for a little bit just try give it a try.

I'm trying it a little and so far it's obvious that I suck at this game   (i'm not coordinated enough for shooter combats).   Having said that, I picked Sentinel.  Is there another class I should restart as that might be easier to manage?  Or (in terms of control scheme!) it's more or less the same, the difference comes in abilities?

I pretty much find myself just sticking to one gun, though I am trying to get in the habit of switching to a different gun when I see someone big and scarey.   And then just trying to aim and fire ...

i do like seeing the biotic powers in action though, but don't know if being that class would be much easier ...

yeah, i know, this game isn't for me, but i'm still giving it a try --  so any thoughts that might make it easier for me?


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## Felon (Feb 8, 2010)

fba827 said:


> okay so i'm borrowing this game from my cousin for a little bit just try give it a try.
> 
> I'm trying it a little and so far it's obvious that I suck at this game   (i'm not coordinated enough for shooter combats).   Having said that, I picked Sentinel.  Is there another class I should restart as that might be easier to manage?  Or (in terms of control scheme!) it's more or less the same, the difference comes in abilities?
> 
> ...



Well, there are two basic types of attacks in ME: weapon attacks and power attacks. Weapon attacks require real-time aiming while with powers you just need to make sure you have line of sight (and many powers don't even have that problem, as they can wrap around or ignore cover). So, focusing on powers minimizes the importance of twitch skills.

The next thing you have to figure out is if you're going to lead from the front or the rear. Consider that in ME only Shepard can heal and revive teammates. If a teammate goes down, you bring them back up. If you go down, you reload from your last save. Logic would seem to indicate that you should try to delegate the role of meat shield to someone else, unless you enjoy the added challenge of having to suffer a lot of point-blank attacks and looking over your shoulder to find your team. Of course, there is also a third option many players avail themselves of: don't lead at all, just let the AI do whatever it wants to do with your squad. Not recommended.

The Sentinel is considered by players and intended by design to be the trickiest class to pull off. The tech armor makes it the toughest class to take down, and it has options that apply against all types of enemies, but what it doesn't have is a strong offense. So, make sure you learn what your teammates can do because you really rely on them to contribute damage.

Some general advice that I've gleaned from bitter failure:

1) Learn how to give orders with the D-pad. In minor skirmishes with a few minions, practice this by staying back and watching them execute your orders. Pressing D-forward makes them both attack the enemy you have targeted, pressing D-left and D-right directs them to move or attack individually, and pressing D-backward releases them from your previous commands and calls them back to your general position. 

2) Use the power wheel button early and often. It's not like calling a time out in football; you're not using anything up by pausing the game. When you start taking fire from an unknown direction, don't break cover and start running around like a headless chicken. Pause and find all the enemies. Note that you can (and should) use the D-pad commands while pausing with the wheel.

3) Those little colored bars that show up when you target an enemy mean something. A red bar indicates health (just regular ol' hit points). Any other color indicates additional defenses: armor (yellow), shield (blue), purple (barrier. You have to deplete these defenses before you can start attacking their health. An enemy with armor, shields, or a barrier is also going to be resistant to some weapons and immune to some types of powers. A sentinel excels at stripping away shields (with Overload) and barriers (with Warp). 

4) Squadmates with ammo powers can provide the entire team with that ammo's benefits once they get 4 ranks in the power. Cryo and incendiary ammo are good things to have access to.

As far as switching classes to one that requires less coordination, that's probably going to be adept or engineer. They use the power wheel more than weapons.


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## Felon (Feb 8, 2010)

stonegod said:


> Finished my first playthrough. Grand, a bit surprising, and a bit sad. Upgraded the Normandy and did everyone's loyalty missions. My Paragon FemShep had a relationship with Liara in ME1 and (1) wasn't interested in Thrane, (2) thought of Jacob as a bud, and (3) saw  Garrus as a protegé so not going there! Thus, no romance, just a scene of looking at L's picture wistfully.



I finished my first playthrough as well. What a blast!
[sblock=Spoilers]
I lost Zaeed when I put him in charge of the distraction team. Zaeed is a bit of a dirtbag, and it's not like you ever get attached to him, but I do want that 75 point Achievement. I think the lesson here is that having a distraction team will cost you the leader but give you more breathing room in the mission. I'll see after reloading from my save. I'll try banging Tali too while I'm at it, more out of grotesque curiosity than anything else). 
[/sblock]


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## horacethegrey (Feb 8, 2010)

Felon said:


> I finished my first playthrough as well. What a blast!
> [sblock=Spoilers]
> I lost Zaeed when I put him in charge of the distraction team. Zaeed is a bit of a dirtbag, and it's not like you ever get attached to him, but I do want that 75 point Achievement. I think the lesson here is that having a distraction team will cost you the leader but give you more breathing room in the mission. I'll see after reloading from my save. I'll try banging Tali too while I'm at it, more out of grotesque curiosity than anything else).
> [/sblock]



Er...
[sblock=Spoilers]
You don't necessarily have to lose anyone by picking them to lead the distraction team. Miranda or Garrus can lead the team just fine without losing their heads. 
[/sblock]


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## Felon (Feb 9, 2010)

horacethegrey said:


> Er...
> [sblock=Spoilers]
> You don't necessarily have to lose anyone by picking them to lead the distraction team. Miranda or Garrus can lead the team just fine without losing their heads.
> [/sblock]



Well, if you say so, but...
[sblock=spoilers]...pretty lame if only those two can survive, since that makes the matter of who lives or dies less about exercising enough good judgment to pick a qualified individual than it is about being lucky enough to pick a random candidate from a number of qualified individuals (or looking it up online). Zaeed has got at least as much experience at that sort of skirmish than those two. 

Btw, there are two points where you pick alternate team leaders. Miranda wanted to be the leader on the first team (that opens the door) and I picked Garrus. He got through fine, and I assume Miranda would have as well since she's the candidate the game was pushing. Now, the second team is the distraction team, so if they're once again the two survivable candidates, it kinda makes it pointless to have to pick a leader a second time.[/sblock]

At any rate, I still plan to do the suicide mission again, and I'd rather not be told flat-out what the right choices are like that, so I guess I'm not gonna read any spoilers you might reply with for a while.


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## stonegod (Feb 9, 2010)

[sblock=Felon]I think the "deaths" are somewhat random: Its affected by loyalty and upgrades (esp. on the ship). I went back w/ my all loyal crew and took Mordin with me this time and no one in the hold-the-door team died. Loyalty helps, but its not 100% I think.[/sblock]


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## Felon (Feb 9, 2010)

stonegod said:


> [sblock=Felon]I think the "deaths" are somewhat random: Its affected by loyalty and upgrades (esp. on the ship). I went back w/ my all loyal crew and took Mordin with me this time and no one in the hold-the-door team died. Loyalty helps, but its not 100% I think.[/sblock]




Without posting any more spoilerblocked text, I'll just say it may be that performance factors (such as time taken to complete a given objective) are variables weighed against a candidate's competence at a given task.


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## Felon (Feb 13, 2010)

Completed the final story mission three times now, and done every sidequest I could find. My save file shows total playing time at 61 hours, and still didn't manage to make it to level 30.


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## SolitonMan (Feb 17, 2010)

I'm ambivalent about this title so far.  I've played it through once, and honestly the planet scanning was so jarringly boring and ill-implemented that I'm dreading going through another playthrough (which sucks, since I played through ME1 at least seven times).  It's kind of like a kick in the teeth that you have to do this.  Bioware even started a thread on their ME general forum with tips on how to speed it up, which if they feel the need to do, maybe they should have tried something else in the first place?

And nevermind the fact that, yes, if you have AIs and crew members they should be doing this.  Just in the RL implementation, you couldn't make the switch to scan a TOGGLE?  I have to HOLD a trigger (Xbox) to scan?  What sadistic bastard thought this up????  

I'll eventually get around to another playthrough, but between the planet scanning AND the implementation of ammo, I'm less than thrilled.  I do have good things to say about it, but the planet scanning is such a peeve that I can't think about them right now...

I am, however, totally digging Dragon Age: Origins.


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Feb 18, 2010)

I consider replaying ME 1, and I am dreading the Mako exploration missions to hunt for artifacts and stuff. I guess I'll ignore that part.

It's more difficult with the ME 2 scanning, but i found once you got the sensor upgrade, it was fast enough. Still, I could do well without it. I do generally like the research/upgrade mechanic, though. And the inventory system. 

I played through it now. I lost a part of my crew, unfortunately, but none of my team members.


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## SolitonMan (Feb 18, 2010)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:


> I consider replaying ME 1, and I am dreading the Mako exploration missions to hunt for artifacts and stuff. I guess I'll ignore that part.
> 
> It's more difficult with the ME 2 scanning, but i found once you got the sensor upgrade, it was fast enough. Still, I could do well without it. I do generally like the research/upgrade mechanic, though. And the inventory system.
> 
> I played through it now. I lost a part of my crew, unfortunately, but none of my team members.




I also think that actually making the resources useful was a brilliant idea.    And I played enough ME1 to get tired of driving the same routes over the same planets time and again.  But that was tiresome over the course of many playthroughs, whereas scanning got tiresome by like the 6th time I was doing it (even with the upgrade to speed and number of probes).  It is just jarringly BAD given the otherwise excellent improvements in the game.  Like the bypass and hacking minigames, they're not difficult or anything, but they're quick, they're at least slightly fun, they take a minuscule amount of skill, and generally you don't have to do them or else risk losing the game.  If you want to survive, you have to upgrade your ship, which means you have to scan for minerals.  I can think of a bunch of ways they could have made this aspect of the game actually FUN, instead of completely not fun.

And that's the crux of the problem, not that scanning "isn't so bad" or "doesn't take too long" or whatever other non-complimentary description is being passed around the Bioware boards.  The point is that it is NOT FUN, and why would anyone deliberately choose to add a feature to a game - which in my experience is something that is supposed to be fun - that is not fun?  It just stymies me.

And while the Mako also got boring after repeated playthroughs, I'll tell you true, that first time, and most of the second, the threat of a thresher maw erupting from the ground made me VERY SCARED when driving over large, open terrain.  It was great!   

I didn't have any part of ME2 that got me nervous or scared or anything.  I liked it mechanically a lot (save for the scanning obviously), I think that the trimmed down inventory system went a bit too far but was a generally great idea, I thought that implementing ammo (whatever in-game term they choose to call it) was going to suck but it wasn't a drawback in any meaningful way, and overall the game was majorly improved.  If only they had done something more intelligent than that planet scanning, I'd probably love the game.  As it is, I'll probably get one more playthrough out of it before I put it on the shelf.


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## wolff96 (Feb 19, 2010)

SolitonMan said:


> I liked it mechanically a lot (save for the scanning obviously), I think that the trimmed down inventory system went a bit too far but was a generally great idea, I thought that implementing ammo (whatever in-game term they choose to call it) was going to suck but it wasn't a drawback in any meaningful way, and overall the game was majorly improved.  If only they had done something more intelligent than that planet scanning, I'd probably love the game.  As it is, I'll probably get one more playthrough out of it before I put it on the shelf.




I'm most of the way through my Insanity playthrough and I have a few comments and opinions of my own.  I quoted SolitonMan because a lot his opinions mirror my own.

On the inventory -- good idea, taken too far.  When you have perhaps four weapons in the entire game, it's time to add a tad more variety.  Why involve a selection screen when you almost invariably want to use the latest and greatest weapon?  I would have liked to have seen a bit more weapon variety of the "This pistol kills armor, this one kills shields, this one kills barriers..."  You get the idea.  Make the choice MATTER and different from mission to mission.

The planet scanning is bad.  I've said it before, I'll say it again.  It's just not fun.  It should have been a quick mini-game resulting in a list of nodes around the planet -- then you could send probes to the ones you needed.  Make the player decide where to spend their valuable probes.  (I would have increased probe cost a bit with this option...)

The ammo is an odd issue.  Some classes -- especially those that rely heavily on the sniper rifle -- complain BITTERLY about the lack of ammo on the higher difficulty levels.  When it takes four headshots to drop someone AFTER their shields/barriers/armor are down, it's kind of ridiculous that you can only carry 12 shots for that type of rifle.  I'm playing an Adept on my Insanity run (I know, I'm a glutton for punishment) and the ammo is a complete non-issue because I'm mostly hiding and using Warp 500 times in a row to cut through enemy defenses.  I might actually shoot my gun half a dozen times in any given mission.

I think the real problem with the ammo isn't the implementation or how generous they are with the clips.  I think the problem is that it feels like a giant step backwards from ME1.


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## Felon (Feb 21, 2010)

wolff96 said:


> I'm most of the way through my Insanity playthrough and I have a few comments and opinions of my own.  I quoted SolitonMan because a lot his opinions mirror my own.
> 
> On the inventory -- good idea, taken too far.  When you have perhaps four weapons in the entire game, it's time to add a tad more variety.  Why involve a selection screen when you almost invariably want to use the latest and greatest weapon?  I would have liked to have seen a bit more weapon variety of the "This pistol kills armor, this one kills shields, this one kills barriers..."  You get the idea.  Make the choice MATTER and different from mission to mission.
> 
> ...



The planet-scanning doesn't really seem to make much sense on the whoe. You shouldn't be able to quickly deplete a planet like that. If you could, then eveyr planet would be a dry husk by now. They want to add a space-exploration eleemnt, and they just couldn't figure out a good way to implement it. 

Then again, I don't think it's much of a spoiler to say that you don't really need to do as much scanning as most people are doing (myself included). You certainly don't need to plunder every single planet you discover. I ended the game with well over 100,000 platinum, palladium, and iridium. Element Zero is rare, but the applications for it don't require very much, so that evens out.

I think your comment about the weapons and your comments about ammo are at odds. The very reason to not pick the latest-greatest sniper rifle is that it only has 12 shots. The starter assault rifle also offers much more ammo than the five-round-burst model.

The intention behind the ammo is that since the heat sinks are usable by all weapons, the player is supposed swap back and forth between weapons frequently to avoid getting low on one.


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Feb 21, 2010)

Felon said:


> The planet-scanning doesn't really seem to make much sense on the whoe. You shouldn't be able to quickly deplete a planet like that. If you could, then eveyr planet would be a dry husk by now. They want to add a space-exploration eleemnt, and they just couldn't figure out a good way to implement it.



One could claim the planets are depleted for the quick-type of mining the Normandy can do, or you are actually just collecting information for suitable mining spot and Cerberus awards you for finding it, but ... That's just fanwank from me. 



> Then again, I don't think it's much of a spoiler to say that you don't really need to do as much scanning as most people are doing (myself included). You certainly don't need to plunder every single planet you discover. I ended the game with well over 100,000 platinum, palladium, and iridium. Element Zero is rare, but the applications for it don't require very much, so that evens out.



Definitely.



> I think your comment about the weapons and your comments about ammo are at odds. The very reason to not pick the latest-greatest sniper rifle is that it only has 12 shots. The starter assault rifle also offers much more ammo than the five-round-burst model.



I never ran into ammo problems with the third assault rifle. But of course that was on normal difficulty.



> The intention behind the ammo is that since the heat sinks are usable by all weapons, the player is supposed swap back and forth between weapons frequently to avoid getting low on one.



Actually I tend to think the intention is to keep the player moving from cover to cover towards fallen enemies and their dropped heat sinks. That is an actually interesting dynamic, I think. 
But you might still be right, it's another aspect of the system. Heavy Weapons tended to be very useful for this purpose to  me - I might be able to gun down some of the heavier enemies with my assault rifle (on normal difficulty), but the Heavy Weapon means I don't waste heat doing so, and I probably cut through its defenses quicker, too.


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## wolff96 (Feb 22, 2010)

Felon said:


> I think your comment about the weapons and your comments about ammo are at odds. The very reason to not pick the latest-greatest sniper rifle is that it only has 12 shots. The starter assault rifle also offers much more ammo than the five-round-burst model.




The only sniper rifle that has more than 12 shot capacity does 1/4 the damage per shot... and conveniently holds 48 rounds.  The rapid-fire versus single-shot is the argument there.  

And I can't comment on assault rifles, the only time I used one was on my Normal playthrough, where ammo is NEVER a problem.



> The intention behind the ammo is that since the heat sinks are usable by all weapons, the player is supposed swap back and forth between weapons frequently to avoid getting low on one.




The game is generous with ammo *between* fights.  It is very lacking in ammo DURING fights.  On Insanity, it takes 1.5 clips with the fully-upgraded pistol to drop the Armor of *one* husk.  Keep in mind that they typically spawn in waves of 3 to 5.  One particular fight (at the end of the IFF mission) has you killing 20-30 husks and abominations per 'round', THEN hammering at the core.  To be fair, after each round of this, some ammo clips respawn...  usually four or five.

I have literally emptied every single gun I carried in fights before.  Thankfully, I could still fall back on Adept-powers.  And your teammates, of course, never run out of ammo.  

The final battle took all of my submachine gun ammo (725 rounds), all of my pistol ammo (24 rounds), all of my sniper rifle ammo (48 rounds), and *FOUR* shots from the Cain.  (A certain enemy drops heavy weapon ammo when killed, trying to avoid spoilers here.)  And all of my guns ran dry multiple times, as there is ammo you can collect from fallen enemies during that fight.

------------------------------------

I think the biggest problem in ammo discussions is difficulty setting.  On Normal mode, as a soldier, I cruised through every fight I entered with plenty of spare clips and OCCASIONALLY switched to an assault rifle when I would have preferred a sniper or machine gun.

On Insanity, I was constantly out of ammunition for all of my guns -- and I'm a pretty practiced FPS player.  Not every shot is a weak-point shot, obviously, but I rarely wasted shots on bulkheads.    This was actually better for me, since it really forced me to learn my Adept powers to the max of their capability.  I have no idea what a soldier would have done...  meleed things to death?

I think there's a lot of room between "you have unlimited ammo" and "you get two clips".  ME2, especially Hardcore and above, really felt like I had no ammunition, regardless of weaponry.  YMMV, obviously.


----------



## Felon (Feb 23, 2010)

wolff96 said:


> The only sniper rifle that has more than 12 shot capacity does 1/4 the damage per shot... and conveniently holds 48 rounds.  The rapid-fire versus single-shot is the argument there.



Is there some listing of damage ratings in the game somewhere? All I see are vague descriptions of what defense the weapon is good against. High capacity/rapid fire tends to trump low capacity/high damage, simply because any shot that misses is a waste. Video games sure don't make me envy a sniper's job.



> The game is generous with ammo *between* fights.  It is very lacking in ammo DURING fights.  On Insanity, it takes 1.5 clips with the fully-upgraded pistol to drop the Armor of *one* husk.  Keep in mind that they typically spawn in waves of 3 to 5.  One particular fight (at the end of the IFF mission) has you killing 20-30 husks and abominations per 'round', THEN hammering at the core.  To be fair, after each round of this, some ammo clips respawn...  usually four or five.
> 
> I have literally emptied every single gun I carried in fights before.  Thankfully, I could still fall back on Adept-powers.  And your teammates, of course, never run out of ammo.
> 
> ...



Regarding killing husks, the Dominate power (gained through loyalty) is an AoE isntant-death power for them. I think knowing when to swap out loyalty powers is pretty important. Also important is having the right kind of ammo for the enemies you're fighting, and if you're not a soldier it's very worthwhile to plan ahead so that squad members with ammo powers will be able to get the 4 ranks they need for the "squad ammo" option (it's a pity that no squad members have cryo ammo). Thane's shredder ammo is really nice, and his biotic powers rock as well. He's been my go-to guy for a lot of missions.

Never did find a heavy weapon I really liked. The Cain was a death sentence for my infiltrator, since it takes forever to "warm up" and the cloaking field shuts off as soon as you start using it.


----------



## wolff96 (Feb 23, 2010)

Felon said:


> Is there some listing of damage ratings in the game somewhere? All I see are vague descriptions of what defense the weapon is good against. High capacity/rapid fire tends to trump low capacity/high damage, simply because any shot that misses is a waste. Video games sure don't make me envy a sniper's job.




One of the wiki pages devoted to ME2 has the numeric listings for the PC version of the game -- some devoted fan pulled them all out of the game files.  I doubt they're much different for the console versions of the game.



> Regarding killing husks, the Dominate power (gained through loyalty) is an AoE isntant-death power for them.




So is Push, or any other power that makes them lose contact with the ground...  *provided* their defenses are down.  On Hardcore and Insanity (possibly on Veteran, too, I haven't tried that one) Husks and Abominations have an Armor Bar.  Dominate -- or any other one-hit power -- won't kill them until that Armor is down.

NOTE:  Have to qualify that statement...  I can guarantee it won't kill them through their armor on Insanity.  I never tried it on them with their Armor up in Hardcore.



> I think knowing when to swap out loyalty powers is pretty important. Also important is having the right kind of ammo for the enemies you're fighting, and if you're not a soldier it's very worthwhile to plan ahead so that squad members with ammo powers will be able to get the 4 ranks they need for the "squad ammo" option (it's a pity that no squad members have cryo ammo). Thane's shredder ammo is really nice, and his biotic powers rock as well. He's been my go-to guy for a lot of missions.




We definitely agree on Thane, he's my go-to guy for nearly every mission in the game.  Our mileage does vary, though -- I never found much use for his Shredder Ammo, because enemies were typically dead as soon as I got their defenses stripped.  (Again, I was playing an Adept.  Once your defenses are gone, I have six different ways to kill you!  )I just liked him for his unlimited ammo sniper-rifle and Warp.



> Never did find a heavy weapon I really liked. The Cain was a death sentence for my infiltrator, since it takes forever to "warm up" and the cloaking field shuts off as soon as you start using it.




The Cain is handy against a few of the slower moving, heavy attack creatures -- like that last boss.  You have plenty of time to charge it up and fire a shot before his attack animation turns deadly.  

About the only other one I ever used was the Collector Beam -- playing it back and forth over a crowd of charging Husks was a good way to drop their Armor, setting them up for a good old-fashioned Shockwave.  LOVED to send those guys flying, especially because they were death for my Adept more than any other enemy in the game combined.  I'd rather face a whole spawn of Harbingers than a big wave of Husks...


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully (Feb 24, 2010)

Collector Beam was my favorite heavy weapon. Simple to use, effective.


----------



## ST (Mar 1, 2010)

Veteran has armorless Husks, and I still found them pretty nasty because I'd let them flank me. I found manually placing party members to keep them from doing that helped a lot.

As far as stripping the armor, Mordin's AOE Incinerate is a beautiful power and would probably do the trick. (Every time I brought Mordin on a mission against organics, I was glad I did.) But yeah, that's totally a place where they "change the rules" in that Husks and Aboms are much more of a threat if you have to soften them up first.


----------



## SolitonMan (Mar 4, 2010)

I'm in the midst of my second playthrough now, started on Hardcore I think it was, but I was getting too frustrated with the dying, and went back to casual for some fights, upping the difficulty in some areas and lowering it back in others.  I can tell you right now it's unlikely I'll ever play on Insanity in this game (although it's all I used after my second playthrough in ME1).

RE: Ammo - I've seen people talking about unlimited ammo as if it's a bad thing, but you have to remember that it wasn't a default in ME1, it was a configurable option.  If you didn't want unlimited ammo, you didn't use Frictionless Materials to upgrade your weapon.  If you wanted to be REALLY hardcore, you'd use High Explosive Ammo in every weapon.

I'm not a person who looks for "realism" in my video games.  If I want realism, I PUT DOWN the video games, step away from the computer, and get out of the house.    When playing a video game - especially a single-player only title like ME or Morrowind or whatever - I like to have the option to be all-powerful if that's what I'm in the mood for.  I had so much fun playing in GTA:San Andreas when I felt the need to destroy things - turn on god cheat, load up on heavy weapons, and run rampant through the streets for a while.  Who cares if that's what I enjoy?

I don't understand why companies don't recognize that they can appeal to a wide swath of gamers' preferences and still make money.  In ME2, they could have easily included an "ammoless" option that would let us use the mechanic of the ME1 weapons so that we'd not have to deal with looking for "thermal clips".  And would have avoided the RIDICULOUS retcon to an otherwise great setting.   

I can understand the need for balance in a multiplayer game, if one person can cheat or completely overpower everyone then no one has fun.  Choosing to play in a shared sandbox necessarily means limitations.  But why in the name of all that's holy would you NOT give gamers MORE options, MORE power, MORE control over their personal experience of the game?  It just doesn't make any sense to me.  It's not as if stifling my desires for the experience is going to make me more likely to buy DLC (and what a scam that is...), it'll make me less likely to have anything to do with the game, or with the game's developer if I feel that they're deliberately screwing me over just to make an extra buck.

This is the first time I can ever say that I've been disappointed with a title from Bioware.  They're stuff is usually among my favorite games.  I was hoping that the changes from ME1 would be along the lines of what Lionhead did with Fable - improve the things that worked, making them even better, get rid of the things that sucked, and add a few new features.  With ME2 I feel Bioware basically created a brand new game that shares only it's wrapper with the previous one.

Not that any of this blathering on my part means diddly.    I'll move on, Bioware will put out more stuff that I DO like, and eventually this will be just another forgotten disappointment in life, heaped on the pile like so many others...


----------



## WizarDru (Mar 11, 2010)

Finished it this past weekend.  Outstanding game from beginning to end.  Yeah, the scanning got dull...but if I'd realized I was better served just by one mining rich planets, generally, I would have been better served (and much of the text indicated when you found stuff, like the 'eezo trio', for example).

I missed the Mako missions...so I'm happy that the DLC is adding the Hammerhead in it's place.  And maybe I'll get 30th level, too.

For the final mission: 



Spoiler



I didn't lose anyone.  I found a collected matrix that indicated who were the best choices (collecting the results of a lot of people) and suggesting which upgrades were the most relevant towards party survival in the final battle.  The final tests weren't at all random, from what I can tell...many of the discussion leading up to the tests indicated who'd be the best choice each time.  Choosing Zaeed, the loner mercenary, to lead one of the teams...probably not the best choice. 



What I particularly liked was the multiple and numerous call-outs to the events of ME1, such as 



Spoiler



the asari on Ilium who was mentally channeling the Rakni queen I'd spared


 or 



Spoiler



getting sweet, sweet revenge on that video reporter who tried to exploit me


.  The character interactions were fantastic and the NPCs were so well crafted it made me actually kind of sad to finish it.

My favorite gun?  The Black Hole generator.  Husks and Collectors go WHEEEEE!


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## Felon (Mar 12, 2010)

WizarDru said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> Choosing Zaeed, the loner mercenary, to lead one of the teams...probably not the best choice.



"Loner"? Guy led plenty of people. Suffice to say, I figured that if squad choices really mattered, they wouldn't limit the player to keep tagging the same person as the "right" choice. Why even ask for a re-pick if you are supposed to just stick with the previous choice? That was disappointing.


----------



## WizarDru (Mar 12, 2010)

Felon said:


> "Loner"? Guy led plenty of people. Suffice to say, I figured that if squad choices really mattered, they wouldn't limit the player to keep tagging the same person as the "right" choice. Why even ask for a re-pick if you are supposed to just stick with the previous choice? That was disappointing.




He led them so well that they shot in the face and left him for dead and after a couple of years, no one even remembered he was one of the two guys to start the organization.  Not what I'd call a stellar leader. 

I'm not sure what you mean about 'tagging the same person for the right choice'?  There were several correct choices for each turning point...but part of it was dependent on making things like loyalty and equipment upgrades.  (Jack isn't as powerful as Samara without implants, for example...which matters during the shield sequence).  But checking over some of the collected data, there were quite a few variations that would prove successful.

Every choice had at least two excellent choices and some that would still work.  It seems to have a lot to do with having their loyalty and upgrades AND your paragon or renegade value.  Specifically, 



Spoiler



If you're paragon value or renegade value is below 80% or so when a couple of the characters come into conflict (as happens twice) or one of them will no longer remain loyal.  The only way to get them loyal again is to max out your bar.


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully (Mar 13, 2010)

I am too good at this game.  Naturally I worked to ensure everyone was loyal, that I picked most of the paragon choices, and that I could acquire all upgrades. Nothing could go wrong. 

(Obviously, I am not good, it's just because I am a completist. No thread can be left dangling...)


----------



## Felon (Mar 13, 2010)

WizarDru said:


> He led them so well that they shot in the face and left him for dead and after a couple of years, no one even remembered he was one of the two guys to start the organization.  Not what I'd call a stellar leader.



If you're going to impugn Zaeed's leadership because he was betrayed by his merc buddy, then you can also toss out 



Spoiler



Garrus who was similarly betrayed, similarly maimed, and who got his last squad slaughtered wholesale, thus resulting in nobody being around to attest to what a superlative leader he is


. And then there's our other "stellar" choice, 



Spoiler



Cerberus dog Miranda who is distrusted by many of her teammates (Jack points this out right before you are presented with a choice)


. Your knocks against picking Zaeed strike me as argumentative given that just about every character comes on board with baggage packed full of regrets and failures, and only Shepard can claim to have everyone's loyalty. Since the team covers the ideological spectrum from selfless saint to mass murderer, you can't pick a stellar leader that everyone's going to be inspired by, so just go for tactical experience, tenacity, and ideological neutrality. Seems pretty reasonable to me.



> I'm not sure what you mean about 'tagging the same person for the right choice'?  There were several correct choices for each turning point...but part of it was dependent on making things like loyalty and equipment upgrades.  (Jack isn't as powerful as Samara without implants, for example...which matters during the shield sequence).  But checking over some of the collected data, there were quite a few variations that would prove successful. Every choice had at least two excellent choices and some that would still work.



There are not many variations at all. Not "many", not "several", or even a "few", if we're taking those terms literally. In the leadership role, you need to pick 



Spoiler



Garrus or Miranda if you don't want a corpse


. Then you're asked to pick another leader...but it's 



Spoiler



Garrus and Miranda again (with Jacob--who has never beend presented as a strong leader before--thrown is as a spare). So, you might as well just stick with what you picked before


. 

Likewise, there are 



Spoiler



two correct choices for biotics expert (Jack and Samara) and two choices for tech expert (Legion and Tali). At least the latter choice is fairly cut-and-dried


. However, it's especially counter-intuitive that 



Spoiler



Mordin isn't suitable for any of those roles. He has both squad leadership experience and he's a tech expert (and not just in an abstract sense: his powers are all tech powers).


. 

Here's the matrix for suicide-mission survival. Hold on to your socks: 

[sblock=Felon]1) Buy every upgrade that you got a from a character. 2) Do all loyalty missions. 3) After doing any kind of mission (even a five-minute quickie you got from a planet scan), talk to everyone you did a loyalty mission for. Repeat until they run out of things to say. 4) When presented with choosing someone for a role, don't overthink, just cross your fingers and try to pick one of the two choices that Bioware decided you must pick.[/sblock]

Pretty breathtaking in its complexity, eh? What I had hoped was that my choice would shape the parameters for the mission, like how much time I have to complete an objective, or the path I have to take to it. But you're not picking a teammate to be a mitigating factor, you're just picking a survivor or a corpse.



> It seems to have a lot to do with having their loyalty and upgrades AND your paragon or renegade value.  Specifically,
> 
> 
> 
> ...





Spoiler



If you're talking about the two scenes that I think you're talking about, that's 



Spoiler



not about succeeding in the suicide mission. That's about succeeding in romance (granted, both require loyalty)


.


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## horacethegrey (Mar 14, 2010)

Felon said:


> If you're going to impugn Zaeed's leadership because he was betrayed by his merc buddy, then you can also toss out
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Yeah Zaeed was betrayed just like 



Spoiler



Garrus


, but as WizarDru pointed out, he really isn't much of a leader. His stories of leading merc bands on missions with him emerging as the only survivor are a pretty clear indicator of this. 



Spoiler



Garrus on the other hand, led many successful raids on the merc bands of Omega for a number of months before Sidonis' betrayal did them in. And no one attests to Garrus leadership skill? The mercs on Omega were pretty glowing in their praise of how his squad would constatly f**k them over.





Felon said:


> Likewise, there are
> 
> 
> Spoiler
> ...





Spoiler



Mordin is a doctor, his specialty is biology. It was never mentioned anywhere within the game that he had the same level of technical expertise of Tali or Legion. And the tech powers are just a gameplay mechanic that wouldn't neccesarily translate into a story mechanic. As for leadership, while he was a member of the Salarian Special Tasks Group, Mordin never states that he led any of their operations. The only thing he could take credit for was leading the team of scientists that updated the Genophage.


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## Felon (Mar 15, 2010)

Horace, while it's tempting to go down the line deconstructing point-by-point, like how what you say about 



Spoiler



Mordin's field experience also applies to Jacob, yet one is a right choice and one isn't


, the truth of the matter is that as I already told Wizardru, all hindsight-based rationalizations are argumentative. It's easy to play up one character's qualities over another, particularly when you actually have access to the textbook answers. The bottome line is, 



Spoiler



I went with Garrus for the first leadership role, and then when I was presented with the second leadership choice, I figured that was the game's way of intimating that my first pick needed to be relieved--after all, why tell me I need to pick a leader again if it wasn't important to switch up, right? Nope. Silly me, just tag him again! 

But nobody seemed ideal. Miranda and Jacob were the other correct choices, but the distrust of the Cerberus agents has been pretty openly mentioned (And Jacob? How does he rise to the top?). Zaeed's dossier says he's recruited for his tactical skills, so he seemed like a reasonable choice relative to what was left over. Since this is the dirty dozen of outer space, disqualifying someone for their status as a loner or misfit at the time of recruitment doesn't really work


. By design, there's really only one ideal leader, and that's Shepard.


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## Vigilance (Mar 16, 2010)

Felon said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> ...




See, and this might just be me, but I felt the game did a great job of giving you enough information to make informed choices. 

For example: 



Spoiler



Zaeed isn't just a loner at recruitment. This often pointed to as a flaw in his design, but you never bond with him. You bond with him less than Jack, and I don't think they made that choice because it was easier, I think it was an artistic choice.

I considered Zaeed as a fire team leader, and then remembered that little surveillance set-up he has on a laptop in his quarters- this is NOT a man who trusts anyone else on that team.

For me there was also the little matter of how completely insane he was in his loyalty mission, to the point that I put a gun to his crazy-ass head. Again- he didn't consider anyone's lives- not mine, not civilians- this is not a man you want leading others, if your goal is bringing them back alive.

On the other hand, since you mentioned Miranda, I felt like I grew to trust her during her loyalty mission. See, at the end of that mission, its a good vibe, you're giving her advice about her sister, helping her bond, she says she owes you, you see some rare tears from her, etc.

Holding a gun to Zaeed's head? Basically telling him I'll smoke his crusty ass if he steps out of line again? Not so much on the trust thing.

The thing I love most about the endgame is how it rewards you having learned your team and actually spent time thinking of them as people. Maybe I was on the same wavelength as the devs, but I went into the end without a single spoiler, and every choice seemed easy to make to me.


----------



## Felon (Mar 16, 2010)

Vigilance said:


> See, and this might just be me, but I felt the game did a great job of giving you enough information to make informed choices.
> 
> The thing I love most about the endgame is how it rewards you having learned your team and actually spent time thinking of them as people. Maybe I was on the same wavelength as the devs, but I went into the end without a single spoiler, and every choice seemed easy to make to me.[/spoiler]



I don't think it's just you, but it certainly sounds to me like if you didn't get burned, there's an inclination to commend Bioware for "rewarding you for having learned your team". You'll cite a surveillance camera as a significant clue in the decision-making process, but dismiss the open animosity expressed towards Cerberus and Miranda in particular as a factor weighing against her? 



Spoiler



You have to break up a fight between her and Jack, and Jack even openly fusses about Miranda right before the leader choice comes up. But these aren't clues to not to pick Miranda


. 

And I'll freely admit that, conversely, I'm not inclined to emphasize the incongruities specifically because I did get burned. Both views are self-servingly subjective.

You say that you felt you grew to trust Miranda during her loyalty mission. The outcome of my loyalty mission with Zaeed is that he had a nice little catharsis and then got his mind focused on the mission. "Not so much on the trust thing"? Did you earn his loyalty? If so, then he's loyal. If not, then he's not.

FWIW, we don't get full-blown dialogue scenes with Zaeed because he is an add-on character (mechanically, he's just a modded Archangel). The same will go for the next downloadable party member that's on the way, Kazumi.


----------



## Vigilance (Mar 16, 2010)

Felon said:


> You'll cite a surveillance camera as a significant clue in the decision-making process, but dismiss the open animosity expressed towards Cerberus and Miranda in particular as a factor weighing against her?




No, I considered that animosity, which is why I had Miranda lead the fire team, while I brought Garrus and Jack with me. Problem solved- I had my second best leader running the fire team and the complainers got to work with me. 

As it turns out, their protests don't seem to matter, but I took them into account.



> You say that you felt you grew to trust Miranda during her loyalty mission. The outcome of my loyalty mission with Zaeed is that he had a nice little catharsis and then got his mind focused on the mission. "Not so much on the trust thing"? Did you earn his loyalty? If so, then he's loyal. If not, then he's not.




I guess it depends on whether you help him or not. I got his "loyalty" but by sticking a gun in his face and telling him he'd get shot in the face if he stepped out of line.

And again, he's clearly a loner.



> FWIW, we don't get full-blown dialogue scenes with Zaeed because he is an add-on character (mechanically, he's just a modded Archangel). The same will go for the next downloadable party member that's on the way, Kazumi.




Maybe- I assumed he was really like that, especially with the surveillance cameras watching the rest of the ship. Either way, he's clearly a loner.

And part of the reason why complaints about the end puzzle me is that they seem to be people bitching that they couldn't get a perfect ending. If you want everyone to live, you can go back to a save before the endgame and make different choices.

If you want to do it "your way" you can, and pretty much every scenario ends with you winning (assuming you prepared properly), you just have to roll with some casualties. 

The only ways to avoid something like this happening would be if A) the devs could read your mind and B) if your decisions prior to the endgame meant nothing and it all came down to your preparations.

I *liked* the fact that both what I did during the game at large and decisions I made at the end mattered, and I liked how the entire team was involved.

I think I would have liked these things just as much if I'd lost a few crewmembers. Hell, I was *expecting* to, based on what I'd heard.


----------



## WizarDru (Mar 16, 2010)

Felon said:


> If you're going to impugn Zaeed's leadership because he was betrayed by his merc buddy




Well, I'm impugning his leadership because the rest of his mercs helped and after 20 years, Zaeed not only hasn't got his revenge but is still a loner.  Maybe his introduction colored my thoughts on the matter: "_You may know the name; Zaeed has been involved in some of the best known (and some utterly unknown) military operations in the Terminus Systems, and is feared as a ruthless and relentless bounty hunter._"  The Illusive Man calls him a bounty hunter and 'involved' in operations, but not leading them.  Combine that with how I took his personal mission and his tales in the hold of being a lone survivor more than once...and I didn't take away 'leader'.  YMMV.

Garrus serves in C-Sec for years and with only 12 guys manages to hold out against three mercenary companies for weeks...only losing his loyal men when he gets lured away by a single traitor on his team.  A traitor who lives with regret every day for betraying his leader and team.  I can see how you thought Zaeed was a leader, but I just didn't get that from him, while Garrus (over the course of two games) seemed exactly the type to me.

I understand that the crux of your discontent is that you assumed you'd use all the characters and when presented with a choice, figured that they must want you to mix it up and use all the characters, not just the same ones.  That's not an unreasonable assumption to make, but most folks didn't seem to do that.   I think you've got a legitimate complaint that it's simply not as granular a choice as it could be and maybe they'll make it a more compelling and diverse choice in the next game.




			
				Felon said:
			
		

> If you're talking about the two scenes that I think you're talking about, that's
> 
> 
> 
> ...




Actually, they are important to the mission because if you're renegade or paragon scores aren't high enough, then you'll lose the loyalty of one or both for the final mission...and that has a direct bearing on their survivability.


----------



## Felon (Mar 16, 2010)

WizarDru said:


> Garrus serves in C-Sec for years and with only 12 guys manages to hold out against three mercenary companies for weeks...only losing his loyal men when he gets lured away by a single traitor on his team.  A traitor who lives with regret every day for betraying his leader and team.



Oh, does he? He didn't get much of a chance to chat in my mission.  I guess that underscores something else worth mentioning: Zaeed probably doesn't stand out as being all that bad if you're pursuing a renegade-heavy path, where Shepard himself is acting like a ham-fisted, self-important loose cannon (and succeeding nonetheless). Since I imported my old paragon Shepard, the actual net effect was that I topped-off my paragon meter fairly easily and thus wound up choosing renegade options afterwards. 



> Actually, they are important to the mission because if you're renegade or paragon scores aren't high enough, then you'll lose the loyalty of one or both for the final mission...and that has a direct bearing on their survivability.



Ah. Check.


----------



## Felon (Mar 16, 2010)

Vigilance said:


> No, I considered that animosity, which is why I had Miranda lead the fire team, while I brought Garrus and Jack with me. Problem solved- I had my second best leader running the fire team and the complainers got to work with me.



I employed similar reasoning, but did the reverse, keeping her with me and altnernating and Thane (whose just too handy against the collectors not to bring along). Miranda's the only squad member whose class ability buffs the whole squad, not just herself. Plus, she can warp those biotic shields away. Then they presented a restructuring, at which point I re-picked needlessly.



> The only ways to avoid something like this happening would be if A) the devs could read your mind and B) if your decisions prior to the endgame meant nothing and it all came down to your preparations.



Not sure what you mean when you parse out decisions from preparations,  however, I'd say there is an option C, which as I mentioned is for there to be a little more complexity to it than just picking a survivor or a corpse. Also, I'd suggest to Bioware not faking players out by asking them to re-pick their leader when the correct choices remain the same.

On the whole, however, I'm quite satisfied with how the story ended.


----------



## Truth Seeker (Mar 20, 2010)

First play through...level 28 (58 hours+). On second play through, got the 30 lvl achievement.


Felon said:


> Completed the final story mission three times now, and done every sidequest I could find. My save file shows total playing time at 61 hours, and still didn't manage to make it to level 30.


----------



## DreadPirateMurphy (Mar 22, 2010)

ME2 plays well, though it suffers from fridge logic.

1)  Why would anybody give up effectively unlimited ammo for a slightly greater rate of fire?  Why not leave a permanent heat sink in the gun to use for a slower rate after you've used all the disposable ones?  (An even more nitpicky question is how they keep all of the heat sinks from heating up at the same time, given that heat travels by both conduction and convection.)

2)  How is it that all of these inhabited planets have relatively large quantities of valuable metals just lying around untouched?  How many people would ignore a big pile of _platinum_ sitting around?  It can't be that hard to get, since a scouting probe is capable of collecting it.

3)  Why is it that both the Council in the first game and Cerberus in the second are willing to let their top agents self-fund operations via petty theft and cybercrime?  You would think your character would at least draw a salary from the Alliance...or do all those human soldiers work for free?

4)  Who would build a scouting vehicle (from the first game) that handles like a five-year-old on a trampoline?

5)  The Alliance lost six frigates defending the Citadel at the end of the first game.  Throughout both games, you get the impression that all of the major powers have relatively sizeable navies.  How is that the Alliance needs so long to rebuild and recover from the loss of just six ships?

6)  How is it that an AI capable of hacking into a completely alien ship's network is incapable of triangulating a radio signal without physically sending a probe to a planet's surface?  For that matter, I wouldn't think letting EDI handle the resource scanning would be that much of a risk, rather than doing it manually.

7)  Cerberus is thought of as a terrorist organization, especially by the Council.  How is it that the crew can walk around the Citadel fully armed and armored while blatantly wearing the Cerberus symbol?  They're obviously recognized -- the Quarians with Tali in the first mission had no trouble identifying them, presumably by their gear.

8)  How is it that weapons capable of piercing kinetic barriers and personal armor pose no risk whatsoever to the hull of any ship or space station?  Nobody ever expresses any concern.

9)  Who in their right mind would move to a colony world in a hostile section of the galaxy without any defenses?  Ignoring the Geth and the Collectors, you have pirates, raiders and slavers, including Batarians and other races.  Sure, a small number might take the risk, but planets like Eden Prime had fairly sizeable populations.

10)  For somebody holding the role of the most important ambassador from Earth, has anybody ever seen Udina be diplomatic with anybody?  He isn't even subtle when he's talking to the Council, never mind his own staff.

Just sayin'...


----------



## WizarDru (Mar 22, 2010)

DreadPirateMurphy said:


> ME2 plays well, though it suffers from fridge logic.




I'm not sure what fridge logic is, exactly.  Some of your questions have answers in-game in the codex.



DreadPirateMurphy said:


> 1)  Why would anybody give up effectively unlimited ammo for a slightly greater rate of fire?




From the codex:  
_*Geth adaptation*
It was long thought that personal weapons had plateaued in performance, but the geth proved all theories wrong. Mathematically reviewing their combat logs, the geth found that in an age of kinetic barriers, the weapon with the most rounds down-range the fastest wins. Combatants were forced to deliberately shoot slower to manage waste heat or pause as their weapons vented.
To eliminate this inefficiency, the geth adopted detachable heat sinks known as thermal clips. While organic arms manufacturers were initially doubtful this would produce a net gain, a well-trained soldier can eject and swap thermal clips in under a second. Faced with superior enemy firepower, organic armies soon followed the geth's lead and today's battlefields are littered with these thermal clips._

Now, you can say that's an excuse for a new game mechanic and I'd agree...but they do have a justification.



DreadPirateMurphy said:


> How is it that all of these inhabited planets have relatively large quantities of valuable metals just lying around untouched?  How many people would ignore a big pile of _platinum_ sitting around?  It can't be that hard to get, since a scouting probe is capable of collecting it.




Actually, it can...especially if you read the information on the individual planets before prospecting them.  Many of the planets are very hard to investigate or actively mine.  The Normandy-2 has vastly superior scanners to the original and basically is finding deposits more primitive miners have not...or have been unable to do because of bad conditions, pirates or political reasons.  In many cases, the alliance has prevented mining on some planets.



DreadPirateMurphy said:


> 3)  Why is it that both the Council in the first game and Cerberus in the second are willing to let their top agents self-fund operations via petty theft and cybercrime?  You would think your character would at least draw a salary from the Alliance...or do all those human soldiers work for free?




Well, my Sheppard was a paragon, so I'm not sure what you're talking about.   On the other hand, you've hit on the classic trope of most computer and console RPGs...where the heroes have to raise their own money for weapons to save the kingdom/galaxy.  At least here, it's due in part to Sheppard being politically restricted or in places where his SPECTRE status or cooperation with Cerberus either are a problem or not a help, forcing him to have to do things 'off the books'.  And in both cases, the Alliance and Cerberus have given him carte blanche to solve the problem _his_ way.



DreadPirateMurphy said:


> 4)  Who would build a scouting vehicle (from the first game) that handles like a five-year-old on a trampoline?




The Alliance, apparently. =D



DreadPirateMurphy said:


> 5)  The Alliance lost six frigates defending the Citadel at the end of the first game.  Throughout both games, you get the impression that all of the major powers have relatively sizeable navies.  How is that the Alliance needs so long to rebuild and recover from the loss of just six ships?




That depends on what you mean by 'sizable navies'.  All of the races are limited in how many ships of a certain size class they are allowed to have, by Alliance charter.  The asari Dreadnought Deadly Ascension in ME1 is the biggest ship in existence (which may or may not survive the battle, based on what you do).  

The various races all take major ship losses during the Siege of the Citadel, but they haven't lost all their ships....just their ships dedicated to guarding the Citadel.  Before Sovereign's attack, they specifically mention that the Dreadnoughts are all guarding various ME Relays to guard against Sovereign.  Given that without mankind's help, the Deadly Ascension is destroyed, it's safe to say that no ship is singly capable of withstanding it.  We aren't told how many remain at the end of ME1...but it's implied a lot more are destroyed than we get to see.

If the Ascension is destroyed in ME1, you hear a news item in ME2 that says the Asari have ceded their peace-keeping fleet responsibilities to the Turians, who are already the Council enforcers.  If you let the council die in ME1 and they get replaced with an all-Human council, then you hear a news item that the Turians no longer consider the Treaty and are massively building up new ships (implying they fear mankind's ruthless ascension).  A sizable chunk of every race's fleet is spent guarding their interests from pirates, expansionist incursions (see the Skylian Verge) and just keeping the peace.  Said fleets are also expensive, which is why mainkind only has 6 of their alloted 8 dreadnoughts and start ME1 with one under construction.

So it's not that the respective races don't have enough ships...they don't have enough ships to patrol their own territories AND guard the Citadel, generally.  At the end of ME1, the Alliance brings in the entire Fifth Fleet...it's mentioned that mankind has 6 fleets, I think.  So you're seeing a large amount of mankind's fleet in action in ME1.

In ME, the ship sizes go fighter->frigate->cruiser->carrier->dreadnought.  IIRC, only mankind actually uses fighters and carriers.  The Normandy is a frigate, but apparently much more powerful than any ship in it's class by a wide margin.



			
				DreadPirateMurphy;51280826)  How is it that an AI capable of hacking into a completely alien ship's network is incapable of triangulating a radio signal without physically sending a probe to a planet's surface?  For that matter said:
			
		

> [Shrug]  I dunno.  It's a mini-game.  I'm sure there's some trumped-up explanation, but this doesn't really hurt my head, honestly.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


----------



## DreadPirateMurphy (Mar 24, 2010)

WizarDru said:


> I'm not sure what fridge logic is, exactly.  Some of your questions have answers in-game in the codex.




Fridge logic describes those thoughts that you get after the TV show or movie is all over, and you're staring into your fridge looking for a snack, and you suddenly wonder about questions that seem obvious in retrospect.



WizarDru said:


> Mathematically reviewing their combat logs, the geth found that in an age of kinetic barriers, the weapon with the most rounds down-range the fastest wins...Now, you can say that's an excuse for a new game mechanic and I'd agree...but they do have a justification.




BioWare is generally very good at coming up with in-game justifications for changes -- just like they're very good at coming up with involved plots with dozens of characters.  This one just isn't very plausible if you look at the actual in-game performance of assault rifles, for example, in the first game, and think about the massive logistics burden you're adding by having to have all of these disposable thermal clips for your troops.  Add in the idea that every weapon everywhere has been modified in less than 3 years, that the collectors use the same standard sinks, and that you can find heat sinks in the Jacob loyalty mission on a freighter that disappeared _ten years ago_...



WizarDru said:


> The Normandy-2 has vastly superior scanners to the original and basically is finding deposits more primitive miners have not...or have been unable to do because of bad conditions, pirates or political reasons.  In many cases, the alliance has prevented mining on some planets.




Hmmm...still seems odd that after hundreds of 50K year extinction cycles, and recent active exploitation by the Council Races and others, there are so many untapped minerals lying around the galaxy.  The Progenitors were supposed to be more advanced than even the Asari -- yet they gave up on mining eezo on the Omega Asteroid because it was _too hard_?  Meh.



WizarDru said:


> They're considered terrorists by SOME and more in Alliance space than the Citadel.




Well, the Quarians definitely consider them criminals after the fleet invasion, and the Council makes it clear that they are not happy by this turn of events.  At a minimum, you would think the Asari Justicar would see a Cerberus affiliation as a sign of criminality, given their zero-tolerance attitude.  Naturally, the game would be unplayable if they tried to arrest you everywhere you went.  



WizarDru said:


> C-Sec is understaffed and we see plenty of well-armed people walking about the station.  Hell, there's a weapons shop right past the entrance.   Clearly, the Citadel has a system of legally carrying weapons.




The ineffectiveness of C-Sec despite the attack by Sovereign is lampshaded so much that is _has_ to be a jab at current events.



WizarDru said:


> I don't have the codex in front of me, but I'd assume because of the ship's own internal Mass Effect fields.




Apparently, this is true even when the power is off?  Fine, eezo is the phlebotinum that makes the universe go...I'll live with it.


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully (Mar 24, 2010)

> Hmmm...still seems odd that after hundreds of 50K year extinction  cycles, and recent active exploitation by the Council Races and others,  there are so many untapped minerals lying around the galaxy.  The  Progenitors were supposed to be more advanced than even the Asari -- yet  they gave up on mining eezo on the Omega Asteroid because it was _too  hard_?  Meh.



Maybe there was a lot more eezo around in the "old" days and they didn't have to bother with pathetic sources like the Omega Asteroid.

[/fanwank]


----------



## WizarDru (Mar 24, 2010)

DreadPirateMurphy said:


> Fridge logic describes those thoughts that you get after the TV show or movie is all over, and you're staring into your fridge looking for a snack, and you suddenly wonder about questions that seem obvious in retrospect.




Ah, gotcha.





DreadPirateMurphy said:


> Add in the idea that every weapon everywhere has been modified in less than 3 years, that the collectors use the same standard sinks, and that you can find heat sinks in the Jacob loyalty mission on a freighter that disappeared _ten years ago_...




Good points, all.  I guess I just didn't care to think about it all that deeply.  I didn't particularly see the need for the changes, per se...but they offered me enough of a justification to ignore it.





DreadPirateMurphy said:


> Hmmm...still seems odd that after hundreds of 50K year extinction cycles, and recent active exploitation by the Council Races and others, there are so many untapped minerals lying around the galaxy.  The Progenitors were supposed to be more advanced than even the Asari -- yet they gave up on mining eezo on the Omega Asteroid because it was _too hard_?  Meh.




I'd chalk some of that up to unreliable information.  The Proteans are supposed to also 



Spoiler



BE DEAD.


  It may have been too hard compared with the tons of much more easily availble sources elsewhere.  Heck, for all we know, the Reapers may have been leaving deposits around to make sure we find them, like a farmer putting down fertilizer. 





DreadPirateMurphy said:


> , the Quarians definitely consider them criminals after the fleet invasion, and the Council makes it clear that they are not happy by this turn of events.  At a minimum, you would think the Asari Justicar would see a Cerberus affiliation as a sign of criminality, given their zero-tolerance attitude.  Naturally, the game would be unplayable if they tried to arrest you everywhere you went.




Well, they do have explanations for a lot of that in game, including how the Justicar rationalizes it versus her code.  Sure, there's more than a little hand-waving, like when I brought Legion onboard the Citadel (although I should point out that Anderson actually had an explanation for why people didn't freak at the sight of him when I asked).  For a lot of stuff like this, they at least made the effort, even if it isn't necessarily 100% convincing.



DreadPirateMurphy said:


> Apparently, this is true even when the power is off?  Fine, eezo is the phlebotinum that makes the universe go...I'll live with it.




Well, they do go into extensive detail about the armor ship and stations have and the self-repairing nature of the nano-bots within them...which apparently require little to no power.  More likely, they're just not worried about the damage inflicted by small-arms fire.  Or, you know....phlebotinum.


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## DreadPirateMurphy (Mar 25, 2010)

WizarDru said:


> Heck, for all we know, the Reapers may have been leaving deposits around to make sure we find them, like a farmer putting down fertilizer.




Man, if you're going to be ruining the third game for everybody, you should use spoiler tags:

*SPOILER* The eezo is really just Reaper fertilizer, which is why all of the galactic technology is based on it, and why they CAN'T be defeated.  *END SPOILER*

It also explains why you have to put up with so much **** from the biotics on your team in the second game...


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## Remus Lupin (Apr 15, 2010)

Just finished ME 1. Now I've got to figure out how to make some space on my hard drive for ME 2. Good gamey fun!


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## WizarDru (Apr 15, 2010)

Remus Lupin said:


> Just finished ME 1. Now I've got to figure out how to make some space on my hard drive for ME 2. Good gamey fun!




Definitely find a way.  You won't regret it!


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## Welverin (Apr 15, 2010)

Remus Lupin said:


> Just finished ME 1. Now I've got to figure out how to make some space on my hard drive for ME 2. Good gamey fun!




uninstall ME.


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## Remus Lupin (Apr 16, 2010)

Yeah, that's the plan. The problem is that I got that, plus Dragon Age, plus some expansions to NWN as digital downloads, and want to make sure I can back them up before deleting, otherwise I've got to spend hours re-downloading them. So, really it's just a matter of buying an decent sized external drive.


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## Remus Lupin (Apr 18, 2010)

Yay! Just started playing it this morning. Gotta get used to the new controls, but it looks like it's going to be an awesome game!


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## Remus Lupin (Apr 26, 2010)

Still playing. This is a very addictive game! I'm working through the various characters' loyalty quests right now. So far I've got Miranda's and Jake's loyalty, but wasn't able to gain the loyalty of Zaeed, Jack, or Thane (that one was a big disappointment!). I'm trying to stretch it out as long as I can, since I don't want it to end! That's always the mark of a good game.


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## Felon (Apr 28, 2010)

You're in for a good ride. The Thane loyalty mission can be a real burn.

Don't forget to talk to your crew between missions.


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## Remus Lupin (Apr 28, 2010)

Oh yeah, I always go around to most everyone every time I'm on ship to check in. I really regretted that I couldn't keep both Jack's and Miranda's loyalty after Jack's mission (not enough paragon points!). I liked Jack, but since I wanted to romance Miranda, I sided with her.


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## The Serge (Apr 28, 2010)

Remus Lupin said:


> Oh yeah, I always go around to most everyone every time I'm on ship to check in. I really regretted that I couldn't keep both Jack's and Miranda's loyalty after Jack's mission (not enough paragon points!). I liked Jack, but since I wanted to romance Miranda, I sided with her.




The reverse happened for me.  Miranda was pissed.  However, I was able to patch things up a bit later when my Paragon rank went up a little.  I imagine you could do something similar with Jack, although I don't know if you need to have a high Renegade rank or not.


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## Mathew_Freeman (Apr 29, 2010)

Incidentally to this thread, I'm currently playing Mass Effect having already played Mass Effect 2.

It's really interesting to meet some characters in Mass Effect, given the events of ME2 (mentioning no names). I think when I go back and use this save game to play through ME2 again it'll make quite a few changes from the "assumptions" the game made without a previous save.

Also, I'm having a lot of fun filling in the gaps in my ME1 knowledge! You can get a lot of info about what happened previously from ME2, but now I'm getting it in detail...


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## Remus Lupin (Apr 29, 2010)

Yeah, I created a new Shepherd for ME2 (not intentionally, but I had backed up ME1, and though the save game was still on the hard drive; it might be, but it didn't transfer), and the "story" is different than what happened to my Shepherd, particularly with regard to Romance options and the fate of some of the characters).


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## WizarDru (Apr 29, 2010)

Mathew_Freeman said:


> Also, I'm having a lot of fun filling in the gaps in my ME1 knowledge! You can get a lot of info about what happened previously from ME2, but now I'm getting it in detail...




You also will find that much of the information you're passed in ME2 is false, at least with regards to the databank.  Much of the information has been skewed to the party line of events, which often whitewashes what actually happened in the game.


For me, one of the best parts of ME2 was running into people who I'd helped (or had to deal with) in ME1 (in one case getting sweet, sweet revenge).


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## wolff96 (Apr 30, 2010)

WizarDru said:


> For me, one of the best parts of ME2 was running into people who I'd helped (or had to deal with) in ME1 (in one case getting sweet, sweet revenge).




I was amused by the fact that my Paragon playthrough from the ME1 save-file had all kinds of recurring characters...  while my Renegade playthrough (also from a save file) was a great deal EMPTIER.  

Kind of hilarious.


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## Remus Lupin (May 3, 2010)

Ah, finished. Very statisfying. Man, this game does not mind just killing off your supporting characters in the final act, does it?


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## WizarDru (May 3, 2010)

Remus Lupin said:


> Ah, finished. Very statisfying. Man, this game does not mind just killing off your supporting characters in the final act, does it?




No sir, it does not.  You CAN get through with no hands lost, but it's dependent on several things: loyalty levels, right person for the job and equipment upgrades.

I've seen/played through and lost no one.  I've also watched videos of someone who speed-played through the game...the term 'bloodbath' comes to mind.  In case you're wondering...you can finish the game with no survivors.  YES, THAT INCLUDES SHEPPARD.


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## Felon (May 3, 2010)

Remus Lupin said:


> Ah, finished. Very statisfying. Man, this game does not mind just killing off your supporting characters in the final act, does it?



Does it? I was a little bothered by the one character that got killed, and the next go-through I didn't lose anybody, so overall I felt they went kinda soft on the player. However, I guess I took for granted that my Shepard got imported from ME1, meaning he had a lot of paragon and even a decent amount of renegade right from day one. Being able to meet those dialogue tree requirements are pretty key to maintaining loyalty.

How many died off in your playthrough? And how?


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## Remus Lupin (May 3, 2010)

I lost three in the suicide mission **SPOILERS**:

*Grunt*: Swooped down upon and taken away by collector bugs on the way to the final confrontation.
*Jack*: Killed in the rear guard action while I took out the reaper.
*Legion*: Same.

My key mistake, I think, was picking Jack to keep the biotic field up for me as we went through the bug area. If I had picked a stronger biotic, I wouldn't have lost Grunt, and then I probably wouldn't have lost anyone on the rear guard.

I almost literally cried out "No, not Grunt!" when they took him away. I really liked Grunt.


----------



## WizarDru (May 3, 2010)

Remus Lupin said:


> I lost three in the suicide mission **SPOILERS**:
> 
> *Grunt*: Swooped down upon and taken away by collector bugs on the way to the final confrontation.
> *Jack*: Killed in the rear guard action while I took out the reaper.
> ...




Actually, for that sequence, only two characters are capable: Jack or Samara.  But if they weren't loyal or you hadn't got Jack's tech upgrade to her biotics, that could have done it.


----------



## Remus Lupin (May 3, 2010)

Yeah, Samara could have done it. And I almost picked her. She was loyal too, but I wanted to give Jack a chance to shine.

By the way, this is my favorite line from the whole game:

"This is all Joker's fault, what a tool he was! I have to spend all day computing Pi because he plugged in the Overlord!"


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## Aran Thule (May 4, 2010)

That one was good but i preferred what followed when the 'overlord' told a joke.


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## Mathew_Freeman (May 4, 2010)

As noted above, I'm playing through ME1 at the moment, prior to going back to ME2 with a saved character and playing it through again.

I'm really intruiged to see how much stuff is going to end up in ME3:



Spoiler



Example 1: The Rachni. I let the Rachni Queen live in ME1 - is this going to be a blessing or a curse when the Reapers turn up en masse in ME3?

Example 2: The Geth. In ME2 if you do Legion's loyalty quest, you get the option of wiping out a large percentage of them or letting them live. The consequences of this could swing the upcoming battle either way, surely?



And that's only the first two that spring to mind.

Also - killing Thresher Maws in the Mako is good fun. However, please note - do not get within melee range of the damn things...


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## wolff96 (May 4, 2010)

Felon said:


> ...the next go-through I didn't lose anybody, so overall I felt they went kinda soft on the player. However, I guess I took for granted that my Shepard got imported from ME1, meaning he had a lot of paragon and even a decent amount of renegade right from day one. Being able to meet those dialogue tree requirements are pretty key to maintaining loyalty.




I definitely agree with you on thinking it was a little soft on the player.  None of the "who do you use" decisions were that tough -- YMMV, of course -- and the only other real requirement were the upgrades and loyalty missions.

I imported my Shepard, so we started at pretty much the same point.  I'm a completionist, so I was going everywhere and doing everything I could find along the way.  (I completely drained something like half the planets in the galaxy before I realized I was out of stuff to buy...  with like 300k extra of each resource.)

I got to the end of the game and beat it with no casualties.  Then I did my Renegade playthrough and got no casualties, even though I (deliberately) wasn't nearly as thorough.  

I actually made a final playthrough, ignoring loyalty missions and upgrades just to see what would happen -- and wow, was that a bloodbath.  Heh.  I like the ending with Joker, though.  

For the record, that last playthrough was an "everyone's dead".  Lost several just getting to the station, lost one to the bugs, I think someone got shot right after the "tech in the tunnels" section, lost one in the rear guard, one while fleeing, then Shepard bought it at the end.  Awesome.


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## WizarDru (May 4, 2010)

Mathew_Freeman said:


> As noted above, I'm playing through ME1 at the moment, prior to going back to ME2 with a saved character and playing it through again.
> 
> I'm really intruiged to see how much stuff is going to end up in ME3:
> 
> ...




Well, in reference to your first point:  



Spoiler



I also save the Rachni Queen in my ME1 playthrough.  In ME2, I encountered an Asari who had a message from the Queen for me....was, in fact, mentally dominated BY the queen, albeit voluntarily.  The Asari had crashed near the Queen's new hive and the Rachni paid one forward.  She pledged her children to your cause, when the time came to face the Reapers...the Rachni will be there to help Sheppard.



In MY game, anyhow.  I'm very curious to see how that plays out when the final game comes to fruition.


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## Mathew_Freeman (May 5, 2010)

Awesome! Looking forward to having that happen in my ME2 game.


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## Welverin (May 5, 2010)

Remus Lupin said:


> By the way, this is my favorite line from the whole game:
> 
> "This is all Joker's fault, what a tool he was! I have to spend all day computing Pi because he plugged in the Overlord!"




Where's that from?


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## Remus Lupin (May 5, 2010)

After the Collector attack on the Normandy, you wind up controlling Joker for a scene, as he runs through the ship trying to save it. At one point, he's got to give control of the ship over to the AI, and he give that line.

By the way, didn't realize till after that Joker was voiced by Seth Green, and the Illusive Man was Martin Sheen.


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## Welverin (May 6, 2010)

Remus Lupin said:


> After the Collector attack on the Normandy, you wind up controlling Joker for a scene, as he runs through the ship trying to save it. At one point, he's got to give control of the ship over to the AI, and he give that line.




Boy my memory sucks.



> By the way, didn't realize till after that Joker was voiced by Seth Green, and the Illusive Man was Martin Sheen.




I saw too much stuff with them before playing the games not to be aware of. The fact they modeled the characters after the actors made it hard to forget.

Do you watch Chuck? If so did you miss Yvonne as well?


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## Remus Lupin (May 8, 2010)

I don't watch Chuck, so that went right by me, but looking at her picture, she's totally Miranda with blonde hair. But right from the get go, I thought that the Illusive Man both looked and sounded like Martin Sheen. I missed Seth Green right till I went looking for that quote on line, and found out it was him.

I have to admit though, on the whole, they didn't do as good a job with funny cross-banter in this game as they did in Dragon Age, but there were still some great lines.


----------



## Felon (May 8, 2010)

I liked Thane's voice acting the best. That guy should get more work.

I think some really good fiction could come out of Mass Effect's cast of characters. I'd love to read a story about some ME1 and ME2 characters teaming up. Thane and Garrus. Jack and Samara. Grunt and Mordin. Lots of good buddy-movie potential.


----------



## Felon (May 8, 2010)

I liked Thane's voice acting the best. That guy should get more work.

I think some really good fiction could come out of Mass Effect's cast of characters. I'd love to read a story about some ME1 and ME2 characters teaming up. Thane and Garrus. Jack and Samara. Grunt and Mordin. Lots of good buddy-movie potential.


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully (May 10, 2010)

Felon said:


> I liked Thane's voice acting the best. That guy should get more work.
> 
> I think some really good fiction could come out of Mass Effect's cast of characters. I'd love to read a story about some ME1 and ME2 characters teaming up. Thane and Garrus. Jack and Samara. Grunt and Mordin. Lots of good buddy-movie potential.






Felon said:


> I liked Thane's voice acting the best. That guy should get more work.
> 
> I think some really good fiction could come out of Mass Effect's cast of characters. I'd love to read a story about some ME1 and ME2 characters teaming up. Thane and Garrus. Jack and Samara. Grunt and Mordin. Lots of good buddy-movie potential.



Good post, worth to be posted twice, right?

Did I mention my favorite character was Mordin? 

I still haven't tried any of the expansions. And I want to, but there is also Startrek Online...


----------



## Welverin (May 11, 2010)

Remus Lupin said:


> I have to admit though, on the whole, they didn't do as good a job with funny cross-banter in this game as they did in Dragon Age, but there were still some great lines.




There's no in mission talk by the party members in this one, you can't even talk to them in this one. Just a few cases where you can have them comment on the scenery.

Absolutely killed one of the coolest parts of Bioware's rpg's, the inter party banter.



Felon said:


> I think some really good fiction could come out of Mass Effect's cast of characters. I'd love to read a story about some ME1 and ME2 characters teaming up. Thane and Garrus. Jack and Samara. Grunt and Mordin. Lots of good buddy-movie potential.




They have been working on it, there are two novels By Drew Karpyshyn, one of Bioware's writers, and the comic series. I expect they'll keep going with it as well.


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## Mathew_Freeman (May 13, 2010)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:


> Good post, worth to be posted twice, right?
> 
> Did I mention my favorite character was Mordin?




Who else found out that he likes to sing Gilbert and Sullivan? Awesome moment, particularly the awkward silence afterwards before Shepherd makes his next comment.


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (May 14, 2010)

Mathew_Freeman said:


> Who else found out that he likes to sing Gilbert and Sullivan? Awesome moment, particularly the awkward silence afterwards before Shepherd makes his next comment.



I did. 

Unfortunately, my female Shepard was not allowed to pursue a romantic relationship with him.


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## Mathew_Freeman (Jun 2, 2010)

Finally finished Mass Effect 1 over the weekend! And will be starting my third play-through of ME2 in the next few days.

Really enjoyed the climax of ME1, have to say it's a better story and probably game than the sequel in my eyes. That said, the controls and use of powers is much better in ME2, even if the story doesn't come out as feeling quite as epic.

If they can pull it off, ME3 has the potential to be the best RPG in computer-game history. So. Much. Potential.


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## Welverin (Jun 4, 2010)

Mathew_Freeman said:


> Really enjoyed the climax of ME1, have to say it's a better story and probably game than the sequel in my eyes. That said, the controls and use of powers is much better in ME2, even if the story doesn't come out as feeling quite as epic.




I said it's because two isn't telling much of *a* story, you're basically given a mission at the outset and then set free in the galaxy to go about it as you please. That kind of open ended gameplay doesn't lend itself to strong story telling.


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## horacethegrey (Jun 16, 2010)

Well, I just the finished the new _Overlord_ DLC. 

HOOOLLLEEEE CRAAAAPPPP!!! 

This was just brilliant, though I'll admit, not very original. Rogue AI takes over base? Been there, done that. But by god did Bioware ever get the atmosphere right. That feeling of scary robots wanting to kill you? Cranked up to eleven! 

As for the ending - 

[sblock]Didn't you just want to shoot Dr. Archer for what he did to his brother?  Bastard was lucky I was playing with my goody two shoes female Shepard, otherwise I'd have put a bullet to his noggin. [/sblock]

Kudos top Bioware for an incredible DLC.


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## Remus Lupin (Jun 16, 2010)

horacethegrey said:


> Well, I just the finished the new _Overlord_ DLC.
> 
> HOOOLLLEEEE CRAAAAPPPP!!!
> 
> ...




Well, I think you've just given me my cue to start a second play through.


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## Welverin (Jun 17, 2010)

Time to reinstall the game.



horacethegrey said:


> Well, I just the finished the new _Overlord_ DLC.




About how long was it?


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## stonegod (Jun 22, 2010)

Welverin said:


> About how long was it?



Installed it in the morning, finished by dinner with a few other things going on.


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## stonegod (Jun 26, 2010)

Finally beat ME2 Insanity. Brutal. 100% gamerscore complete!


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## wolff96 (Jul 1, 2010)

stonegod said:


> Finally beat ME2 Insanity. Brutal. 100% gamerscore complete!




Heh, I was dumb on my Insanity playthrough -- used my goody-two-shoes Adept Shepard, rather than my far more brutal Renegade Soldier.

Running into packs of Armored Husks with an Adept and needing their armor down before you can actually really hurt them with your powers?  Ouch.  Thank god for the nigh-invulnerable Grunt and his Shotgun.


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## Remus Lupin (Aug 8, 2010)

Just finished my second playthrough with the Overlord expansion. Loved it. I was playing my ME1 imported Shepherd, and was planning to stay faithful to my ME1 romance, unfortunately, I went a bit farther than I intended flirting with Jack, and wound up with her at the end instead.

Oh well. I'll win Ashley back on the next playthrough!


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## Remus Lupin (Sep 7, 2010)

New downloadable content came out today: Lair of the Shadow Broker! Also new Dragon Age DLC today: Witch Hunt.


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## Welverin (Sep 7, 2010)

There's something wrong with the PC version, and it is thus not available until Bioware figures it out and fixes it.


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## stonegod (Sep 7, 2010)

Enjoyed it. Got sme nice closure, and confirmed some of my suspicions. Though short, the goodies are the stuff after the main mission.


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## Welverin (Sep 8, 2010)

Downloading now, will probably play it tomorrow.

Yes, this means the PC version has been fixed.


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## Remus Lupin (Sep 8, 2010)

I'll have to try to download tonight. I'm still playing "Witch Hunt" on DA:O, so probably won't get to this till tomorrow or Friday.


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## WizarDru (Sep 10, 2010)

Too many games, not enough TIME.  Playing Metroid Other M right now and Halo: Reach drops on Tuesday (which is an event in my house).  Finished Prince of Persia: Forgotten Sands a couple of weeks ago...

and I haven't even finished the DLC for Assassin's Creed 2, let alone get ME2 DLC.  OH, the humanity!  [FIRST WORLD PROBLEMS]


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## Shayuri (Sep 12, 2010)

Lair of the Shadow Broker was, IMO, the best ME2 DLC. 

I really liked Overlord too, but Lair had the advantage of filling in some real story gaps, instead of being a self-contained subplot. You finally find out why Liara's so standoffish (assuming romance), and you finally get a chance to actually TALK to her.

I found the writing was great as well. A couple hilarious little stabs at ME1 ("Remember when all you needed was to slap a little omni-gel on?"), and Shepherd, even if you play him/her Paragon, doesn't just let Liara get away with it all without comment.

As noted elsewhere, the post-mission reward is both awesome and hilarious. Be sure to read all the dossiers. They're a hoot.


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## JediSoth (Sep 14, 2010)

I finally got ME2 this weekend (after finished DA:O) and it does not disappoint. I immediately whored myself out and downloaded a bunch of the DLCs (including Kasumi and Shadow Broker, but not Overlord, yet).

I felt a twinge of sadness and guilt as the topic of the crewmember I left to die on Virmire came up, though I ended up romancing Liara in that playthrough. I may have to create multiple saves since I'm thinking Tali might be a more attractive option at this point (plus, the Asari view on romances, i.e. enjoy the time you have together, due to the liftspan issue ("Is this the lifespan talk? I'm not having the lifespan talk.") from a purely meta-standpoint. If Liara is a _good _Asari, she'll understand when I finally get confronted about it in Lair of the Shadow Broker....or she'll flay me alive with her mind, but that would put a real damper on our friendship.

I only wish there were some things male shep could do with Garrus. We should be able to go down to Kasumi's room and drink ourselves silly at the bar and reminiscence about old times; he's like an old buddy at this point.


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## Remus Lupin (Sep 15, 2010)

Finally got to play through Lair of the Shadow Broker last night. Really good, and very challenging at points! I did love a lot of the byplay between Shepherd and Liara, though I wish that you were able to recruit her to your team in the end. Oh well. Very worthwhile expansion.

But ... now what will I do to waste time until the sequels to this and Dragon Age come out? It may be time to play Bioshock.


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## Welverin (Sep 15, 2010)

Remus Lupin said:


> But ... now what will I do to waste time until the sequels to this and Dragon Age come out? It may be time to play Bioshock.




Did you play Fallout 3? If not, you should give that a try, if you have New Vegas will be out next month.

But, more importantly, from what I've read LotSB is only the beginning of the DLC that will span the gap between ME2 and ME3. SO, there should be more ME2 DLC coming our way.


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## Initiate (Sep 18, 2010)

Welverin said:


> But, more importantly, from what I've read LotSB is only the beginning of the DLC that will span the gap between ME2 and ME3. SO, there should be more ME2 DLC coming our way.




God I hope your right. I plan on purchasing the DLC this weekend. I got the free things from the Cerberus Network (Armor, shotgun, missions.) and the Mercenary a couple of days ago. I really want LotSB though. I`ve wanted to find that guy since they first mentioned him in ME1.

Anything they can do to keep me interested in the game until ME3 will make my life.


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## Welverin (Sep 19, 2010)

Initiate said:


> God I hope your right.




It's only my lack of looking up a reference that prevents me from making a definitive statement. I do recall reading about it, I just don't remember where and thus can't verify it came directly from Bioware.

Keep in mind ME2 only came out in March and ME3 hasn't been officially announce, as opposed to DAO, which came out a year ago and the sequel is six months away. So, more DLC makes sense for ME2, where as the DA needs to start focusing on the sequel instead of more content for the original.


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## stonegod (Mar 21, 2011)

FYI: The final "bridge" DLC for ME2 is due at the end of March: Arrival!


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