I'm Commander Shepard and this is also my favorite thread on Obsidian

[Enoch]

I really dislike the semi-auto Viper sniper rifle. The first one you get-- the Mantis-- has very limited ammo, but if I've been keeping up on upgrades, my Infiltrator can use every single one of those rounds to take down a standard enemy mook with a single slo-mo headshot. Get him near the crosshairs, zoom, knock 'em out with one click in slow-motion, and you never have to worry about that dude again. (Even 1 layer of barrier/shield/armor protection isn't enough to prevent a 1-shot kill on a basic enemy-- on Hardcore, I don't even seem to need the damage bonus from Cloaking.)

 

The Viper purports to be an upgrade on this, and has a 12-shot magazine and much larger overall ammo capacity, but it takes at least 4 shots to do the damage that the Mantis does in one. You get less out of the Cloak benefit (a % boost to the first shot), you expose yourself to more enemy fire, and I'm not good enough to get a bunch of headshots in before the slo-mo timer runs out, after which I generally either aim for the torso or miss 2/3rds of the time. Maybe it's more useful for Soldiers who don't get the zoom slowdown, but I don't see it as an upgrade at all for my character.

 

 

Yes, I am counting down the minutes until I can go get the Widow. (I've only done 2 post-Horizon missions so far-- recruiting Tali and Thane.)

Edited March 10, 2010 by Enoch

[Azure79]

I really dislike the semi-auto Viper sniper rifle. The first one you get-- the Mantis-- has very limited ammo, but if I've been keeping up on upgrades, my Infiltrator can use every single one of those rounds to take down a standard enemy mook with a single slo-mo headshot. Get him near the crosshairs, zoom, knock 'em out with one click in slow-motion, and you never have to worry about that dude again. (Even 1 layer of barrier/shield/armor protection isn't enough to prevent a 1-shot kill on a basic enemy-- on Hardcore, I don't even seem to need the damage bonus from Cloaking.)

 

The Viper purports to be an upgrade on this, and has a 12-shot magazine and much larger overall ammo capacity, but it takes at least 4 shots to do the damage that the Mantis does in one. You get less out of the Cloak benefit (a % boost to the first shot), you expose yourself to more enemy fire, and I'm not good enough to get a bunch of headshots in before the slo-mo timer runs out, after which I generally either aim for the torso or miss 2/3rds of the time. Maybe it's more useful for Soldiers who don't get the zoom slowdown, but I don't see it as an upgrade at all for my character.

 

 

Yes, I am counting down the minutes until I can go get the Widow. (I've only done 2 post-Horizon missions so far-- recruiting Tali and Thane.)

 

You should try equipping two party members with the semi-auto sniper rifle. They never miss, never run out of ammo and the amount of damage they both do on one target is staggering, even on insanity.

[HoonDing]

Has anyone managed to kill the Thresher maw on Insanity without using the Cain?

[mr insomniac]

You have to hold the Lmouse button down for a couple seconds with the new arc shooter as well, but it's pretty cool. I just finished recruiting Mordin in my new game, and I only used it once, but it almost instantly wiped out a cluster of four Vorcha - only one of which was out in the open to begin with. I wish I was a little closer to them when it happened, heh, I didn't really get to see it.

You don't really want to be that close to where it hits (thats how I discovered how it worked the first time)

Are you talking about Cain or the new DLC Arc Projector? The AP is awesome, and is now my favourite heavy weapon. There's a side mission - the last in a trilogy of side missions - where you have to shut down a factory that is making infected 'mechs. No big deal except they appear to respawn like crazy. Anyway the AP makes short work of 'em. Bring on them damn husks!

 

The first in that trilogy also contains a lot of respawning 'mechs and an approaching sandstorm that gradually reduces visibility (but it's not that bad). Has anyone else done this mission? Is it just me or did EDI develop a rather masculine voice? It's almost as if Bioware forgot this mission existed and left placeholder VA in place, rather than Tricia Helfer's.

[LostStraw]

Has anyone managed to kill the Thresher maw on Insanity without using the Cain?

Yes. Well.. I tried using the Cain but completely missed the shot. I was playing as a soldier with inferno ammo maxed and it didn't seem too hard of a fight with only the normal weapons but it did take a little while.

[Niten_Ryu]

Has anyone managed to kill the Thresher maw on Insanity without using the Cain?

Yes. I use armor piercing ammo and pistol. And warp (if biotic) and incinerate (if tech). I think time left was 1 min 30 secs.

Edited March 10, 2010 by Niten_Ryu

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

Has anyone managed to kill the Thresher maw on Insanity without using the Cain?

Never used the Cain on it and always killed it. Incinerate works very well on it.

[Deraldin]

Has anyone managed to kill the Thresher maw on Insanity without using the Cain?

 

Yup. My infiltrator took it down with the Widow and my Sentinel took to down with the Tempest. That took a lot of ammo. Neither one had the Cain yet. The Sentinel did use the Collector Beam though.

Edited March 10, 2010 by Deraldin

[mr insomniac]

Just completed Tali's recruit mission again. Ramped up the difficulty to hardcore and picked up the GPR. Geth Primes killed Shepard a couple times, those bastards. But that was mainly due to my not equipping the disruptor ammo beforehand. Oops. It was intense but certainly do-able.

 

Tip: The Arc Projector kills groups of baddies. It kills them real good.

 

Was involved in a discussion earlier about the Alliance's reason for being on Horizon. I was wrong, others were right. I paid more attention this time to Anderson, Ashley, TIM, and even Joker has his suspicions.

[GreasyDogMeat]

Game Informer Magazine

"It seems to take a long time to mine for minerals, and the mechanics for that section of the game aren't very compelling. Did you consider changing up the mechanics for mining or adding more upgrades that would make the process more fluid? Is there any chance that a future patch or DLC could make mining faster?"

 

+1 for Game Informer Magazine.

 

Casey Hudson's Response

"We've had lots of feedback on the orbital minigame, and a frequent comment is that it's 'strangely addictive.' We keep an eye on player suggestions for tuning however, so it's certainly a possibility that we could include adjustments to the speed or balance in a future patch or title update."

 

STRANGELY ADDICTIVE!? Frequent comment!? What is wrong with people? I'm guessing this is kind of like a proctologist saying 'some of my patients enjoyed the checkup'. Some being that one weird guy.

 

Well... I'm hoping for that patch/dlc that makes the process less tedius.

[mr insomniac]

Well... I'm hoping for that patch/dlc that makes the process less tedius.

They could eliminate it altogether and let you buy resources at the fuel depots. It'd give TIM another of example of how broke Cerberus is gonna be because of Shepard.

[GreasyDogMeat]

They could eliminate it altogether and let you buy resources at the fuel depots. It'd give TIM another of example of how broke Cerberus is gonna be because of Shepard.

That would be one way of improving it. I wouldn't mind seeing some sort of trading system where you could minerals for each other with each mineral being worth a certain amount.

 

Here is a handy guide to mining in Mass Effect 2. http://sarcasticgamer.com/wp/index.php/201...-to-mining.html

I never thought of hunting down children to force them to mine for you... brilliant!

[Deraldin]

STRANGELY ADDICTIVE!? Frequent comment!? What is wrong with people? I'm guessing this is kind of like a proctologist saying 'some of my patients enjoyed the checkup'. Some being that one weird guy.

 

You'd be surprised how many people on the bio forums find the mining enjoyable. They aren't the majority, but there is a significant number of them out there.

[Niten_Ryu]

STRANGELY ADDICTIVE!?

 

 

Good thing is that you don't really need those minerals. In my first run I collected every single resource untill planet was depleted (and few extra probes just to be sure) but after I had about 250k of each element, I stopped because no upgrade required more then fraction of it. On next run I only mined planets that had missions on 'em. Run after that I only mined when I really needed some upgrade and on this last run I ignore upgrades complitely.

[Gromnir]

STRANGELY ADDICTIVE!? Frequent comment!? What is wrong with people? I'm guessing this is kind of like a proctologist saying 'some of my patients enjoyed the checkup'. Some being that one weird guy.

 

You'd be surprised how many people on the bio forums find the mining enjoyable. They aren't the majority, but there is a significant number of them out there.

 

am suspecting that there is some certain bio fans that will defend any dumb thing in a bio game. is a groupie phenomenon not limited to bio. can find similar behavior at nma/codex regarding tim cain/troika games.

 

am having a hard time believing that more than the smallest fraction o' players find the resource acquisition scheme to be "strangely addictive." is NOT a mini-game in any meaningful sense... is mind-numbingly repetitive activity that requires no skill or strategy. if players were told that the only way to find 1007 or clues in a game were to be pixel-hunting, the vast majority of players would respond with anger or derision. nevertheless, bio has managed to sell glorified pixel hunts as a mini-game in me2? is even more ludicrous than their suggestion that the dialogue wheel were innovative.

 

side note: we believe that casey hudson's tedious resource acquisition nonsense could be used quite effective as the basis for self-hypnosis experiments. while engaged in finding more platinum or iridium on some nameless planet in yet another otherwise empty and pointless galaxy map system, we discovered that our power animal were the woodchuck. go figure.

 

 

HA! Good Fun!

Edited March 11, 2010 by Gromnir

[~Di]

I actually don't hate the mining thing... but then again, I don't think I'm doing it right! I gather one is supposed to meticulously guide the scanner from pole to pole, covering each "strip" of longitude while the planet slowly turns. I just stick the scanner at the top of the planet, and slide the bugger from right to left at a pretty fair clip until I get a rich jump on the scanner. Then I move down a couple of strips, and scan from left to right. Once I've done the part of the planet facing me, I manually turn the planet until the part I've scanned is off screen, rinse and repeat. I do the planet in thirds this way, and truly it doesn't take more than 3-4 minutes tops. Sure, I may not get every drop of resource, but I've found much more than I'll probably need by being picky about probing only rich pops... saving time, and probe money.

 

Or maybe it only takes 3-4 minutes the other way too. But I still like my way better, and I don't find it particularly irritating. However, just because I found a way to blow through scanning by doing it manually, I can't really say that the way scanning was implemented was particularly well thought-out. Addictive? I don't think so.

 

If they allowed buying resources, though, they'd have to find a way to get a heck of a lot more credits in the game. My resources are always chocked full, but I never have enough credits for everything that I want to buy... which is, of course, everything!

Edited March 11, 2010 by ~Di

[~Di]

You have to hold the Lmouse button down for a couple seconds with the new arc shooter as well, but it's pretty cool. I just finished recruiting Mordin in my new game, and I only used it once, but it almost instantly wiped out a cluster of four Vorcha - only one of which was out in the open to begin with. I wish I was a little closer to them when it happened, heh, I didn't really get to see it.

 

Where do you get this arc shooter? I've recruited everyone except Tali and the geth thingy, done all the loyalty missions and haven't run across it yet. BTW, I got the Widow sniper rifle, but only my soldier can use it. Garrus and Thane are both trained in sniper rifles, but this selection isn't available to them in the weapons locker. Does anyone know why not?

[Deraldin]

You have to hold the Lmouse button down for a couple seconds with the new arc shooter as well, but it's pretty cool. I just finished recruiting Mordin in my new game, and I only used it once, but it almost instantly wiped out a cluster of four Vorcha - only one of which was out in the open to begin with. I wish I was a little closer to them when it happened, heh, I didn't really get to see it.

 

Where do you get this arc shooter? I've recruited everyone except Tali and the geth thingy, done all the loyalty missions and haven't run across it yet. BTW, I got the Widow sniper rifle, but only my soldier can use it. Garrus and Thane are both trained in sniper rifles, but this selection isn't available to them in the weapons locker. Does anyone know why not?

 

The Arc Lightning gun was released on the Cerberus Network yesterday. Not sure if it just shows up or if you have to research it first, but you'll need to download and install it before you can use it.

[213374U]

BTW, I got the Widow sniper rifle, but only my soldier can use it. Garrus and Thane are both trained in sniper rifles, but this selection isn't available to them in the weapons locker. Does anyone know why not?

"Bonus" weapons can only be used by Shep (if acquired on the Collector ship), or whoever gave you the research upgrade. Why? "Fabrication Rights Management". In fact it's just an excuse to gimp your squaddies even more.

 

The game can be modded to allow squaddies to use these guns, but I recommend you finish your first playthrough "legit", so you get a good idea of what you might want to change in the future.

[Gromnir]

as an aside, legion may be upgraded to use widow as well.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[jaguars4ever]

Claymore Heavy Shotty can be used by Grunt, as well.

[Gorth]

You have to hold the Lmouse button down for a couple seconds with the new arc shooter as well, but it's pretty cool. I just finished recruiting Mordin in my new game, and I only used it once, but it almost instantly wiped out a cluster of four Vorcha - only one of which was out in the open to begin with. I wish I was a little closer to them when it happened, heh, I didn't really get to see it.

You don't really want to be that close to where it hits (thats how I discovered how it worked the first time)

Are you talking about Cain or the new DLC Arc Projector? The AP is awesome, and is now my favourite heavy weapon. There's a side mission - the last in a trilogy of side missions - where you have to shut down a factory that is making infected 'mechs. No big deal except they appear to respawn like crazy. Anyway the AP makes short work of 'em. Bring on them damn husks!

I was talking about Cain. The thing didn't come with an instruction manual, so I experimented a bit. Sort of blew up in my hands, shooting a Bloodpack Krogan right in front of me

 

I'll see if I can get the time to check out that Arc Projector.

[Gorth]

STRANGELY ADDICTIVE!? Frequent comment!? What is wrong with people? I'm guessing this is kind of like a proctologist saying 'some of my patients enjoyed the checkup'. Some being that one weird guy.

 

Well... I'm hoping for that patch/dlc that makes the process less tedius.

It's horrible. Tedious, pointless, artificial extension of game length. No redeeming qualities whatsoever. Besides that, it irritates me with the weird "logic", that you don't even know the name of a planet until you have started the scanner, but as soon as you flick the "On" switch, you know everything, right down to population numbers, history and the effin travel advisory for the place.

 

I still think some poor designer somewhere got the ungrateful task of making resource hunting in ME look good by comparison.

[Volourn]

I like the scanning mini game. It's not perfect and can be improved; but it's more fun than other things. And, if some silly goose comes in and claims that I'm just being a 'BIo fanboy'; they obviously have skipped out on ME2 threads. R00fles!

[Gromnir]

I like the scanning mini game. It's not perfect and can be improved; but it's more fun than other things. And, if some silly goose comes in and claims that I'm just being a 'BIo fanboy'; they obviously have skipped out on ME2 threads. R00fles!

 

the fact that vol likes it is a more scathing criticism o' the me2 resource acquisition scheme than any argument Gromnir could hope to devise.

 

HA! Good Fun!