Rachni, Pyjak, Salarian - Mass Effect 3 Coop

[Memph]

Operation: Broadside is on btw folks. All ya gotta do is Reapers on Gold - Ha.

Squad Goal: Extract at least one squad member against Reapers on Gold difficulty
Allied Goal: Extract 400,000 squads against Reapers on ANY difficulty
Special Circumstance: None

Squad Goal Success: All squad members awarded a Commendation Pack
Allied Goal Success: All players awarded a Victory Pack. Medi-gel cap increases from 5 units to 6.

Operation Broadside begins at 10am PST Friday July 13 and ends at 4am PST Monday July 16.

I'm sorted for the squad goal, but if a player is needed, do hit me up :)

[ShadowyMOON]

Oh man, platinum Reapers. Brrrrrrrr. The horror.

[Simmura McCrea]

Platinum Reapers: The only wave is the extraction wave, and it just spawns Banshees constantly.

[QuantaCat]

Did the expansion hit already then? or was it this weekend and I missed it?

[Ravelle]

Did the expansion hit already then? or was it this weekend and I missed it?

I believe it's still forthcoming.

[Memph]

Tuesday or Wednesday ain't it? Possibly depending on what side of the pond one may be on.

I kinda hope we failed the weekend op, just to see what consequences they cook up. Unless it's just more banshees of course.

[Borklund]

Reaper Platinum.

Banshees and Brutes wave 1. Geth Hunters wave 3. Geth Primes wave 4. Then all of the missiles, ammo packs, shield packs and medigel ran out.

Oh god.

[Ravelle]

Reaper Platinum.

Banshees and Brutes wave 1. Geth Hunters wave 3. Geth Primes wave 4. Then all of the missiles, ammo packs, shield packs and medigel ran out.

Oh god.

Prepare the lube. ;p

[Oshada]

And people have already soloed it.

[Wizlah]

Goddam. It would seem the mic on my headphones is fucked, so I'm going to see if I can find a replacement, but that could be sometime, so anytime I'm up on mumble, you can be assured I will be swearing like a mad bastard, even if you can't hear me.

In other news, that new acolyte pistol is weird. I could be wrong, but it feels like the first truly specialist purpose pistol, since all it really does is strip out barriers and shields, so's you can hit your targets with pull or something similar. I see you can get ultralight materials with pistols now, making me think that once I get it to a decent weight, I can combine it with a decent armour stripping weapon and manage a decent recharge speed. Means my justicar might finally drop her boomstick striker for white geth gold.

I like the London map most of the new ones, although it does force you to look up more. As per usual, I've still got no new characters. I picked up a PSP yesterday, only to get an incisor ix. sigh.

[Ravelle]

And people have already soloed it.

And probably spent thousands of dollars on packs.

[Sceptrum]

I do enjoy the new classes, mostly the Paladin, Demolisher & Destroyer. Might have to test a new build for the Shadow.
But hot damn, ain't Origin fubar'ed. I have had disconnects all the time today.

[Wizlah]

I do enjoy the new classes, mostly the Paladin, Demolisher & Destroyer.

One day I might have, like, two of those classes. But I'll have an Incisor X! (says the man still waiting for his krogan vanguard)

But hot damn, ain't Origin fubar'ed. I have had disconnects all the time today.

Wondered whether it was just me. Obviously not. Tried to play a white geth gold with my justicar packing the acolyte and eviscerator, and was doing fine till wave 9 and a disconnect. pah.

Also, I do like the new escort mission - really forces you to think on your feet as you move as a group. Although mostly I just reach for a rocket when it's on gold.

Partly because the few times I've been playing, I've just been grinding WGG, and it's my go-to defensive class, but I'm totally set on the justicar class these days. with the acolyte and the eviscerator, I'm on about 150%, and can pretty quickly deal with armoured targets. everyone else gets wacked with the acolyte (which stays charged whilst you fire off a power), then pulled, then boomed with reave. If anything, I find myself forgetting to spam reave on armoured targets, because I'm mostly a one woman booming machine.

Do have to learn to be more flexible with the biotic dome. I tend to put it up then hunker down in a position for long periods, but if you're a bit more mobile and you've got the recharge rate up, I just have to remember to put it up whatever position I'm in.

In summary, pah to the new classes. It's not like I'm going to get them before 2013 anyway.

[ShadowyMOON]

Platinum is an amazing clusterfuck, but manage to beat it on the second try with a group of buddies. And one of them already got the N7 Fury, grr...

[Oshada]

And probably spent thousands of dollars on packs.

Not really, they just played the game so much that they had pretty much maxed the ultra rares. If you have everything maxed at the start of a new DLC you get every new piece of content (maybe not now, since they've introduced Rare consumables). It's been out for more than 6 months anyway, plenty of time to max stuff.

[Sceptrum]

Been playing a few randoms more to test out the new classes.

The Destroyer (Soldier) is damn fun with Piranha, as the Devastator Mode has increased accuracy and fire-rate, which means I empty the Piranha ammo drum in 2-3 seconds...also the Missile Launcher is nice, but the Multi-Frag Grenade is a bit wonky...with increased radius it hits more but damage is very low, but when I focus on damage, I have to almost hit dead-on to damage anything in a meaningful way.

The Shadow (Infiltrator or rather Phantom!) is fun as hell. On Silver if a Phantom has a wee bit barrier left, they are one-shotted with Phantom Strike. I usually almost-one-shot most mobs leaving them with 1-3 health bars after a Shadow Strike. And oh, it seems Tactical Cloak has gotten nerfed in duration or maybe it is just Fury's variant.

The Demolisher (Engineer) requires Grenade Capacity mod. The supply pylon is damn handy as it generates ammo clips and grenades at 10-15 second intervals and strengthens shields. It can be upgraded to either provide more shields or increased ammo/grenade generation frequency. Oh, you need the Grenade Capacity mod since the other two abilities for Demolisher are Arc Grenades and Homing Grenades. Negative side is that even with pylon you are going to run near ammo crates often to restock. Positive though is that you can use heavy-weight weapons, as grenades are not on power cooldown and the pylon has indefinite duration and you won't be spam deploying the pylons either.

Haven't given the Fury much look, but Annihiliation Field & Dark Channel seem very nifty and Throw is useful for detonating biotic combos.

The Paladin...love the class, but seems only RPS'ers I've played with are capable of understanding the uses of a shield...ie, GET BEHIND IT. I've deployed the shield at times to protect team-mates who are low on health or just ressed or doing an objective, but who then run in front of the shield, even though the enemy is firing at ME and I'm not taking damage at all. They could do as Simmura, and get behind me and start dropping the enemy troops with a sniper rifle, but that might be too advanced a thought to process. Otherwise, no tech-armor for the Paladin, and they get Overload & Incinerate along with Snap Freeze, which is a cone cold attack. Does not do much damage, but slows enemies down and makes them easier to kill, especially if armoured.

The Slayer (Vanguard) is modeled after the Drell, and at times seems to have as much hit points as one...They are a different take on the Vanguard, but not by much. They still got Biotic Charge, but have Phase Disruptor & Biotic Slash. The Phase Disruptor is a long-range beam attack that uses part of your barrier as ammo, while the Biotic Slash is a cone biotic attack with your katanaish sword. Phase Disruptor is decent, but should only be used at range (duh!) and if you are accurate, as the beam does not do an instant hit (basically seems to work like a Graal Spike Thrower). Haven't used the Slash too much since it usually requires you to be out in the open and the Slayer feels squishy. Nice for detonating biotic combos though I'd guess.
The Slayer though has new dodge and melee attack styles, as they basically do the Drell dodge animations while doing a short phase jump/teleport. The melee attack is with their katana and doing a phase jump at same time.

As for the maps, they are enjoyable. I like Rio a lot, as it has a nice mix of open and closed areas, plus Jesus is watching you, so don't let him down.
London is very open and you can easily be flanked by the enemy if not careful or lack of teamwork. One of the Hack Upload objectives though is a BITCH and is in the most open area where its damn hard to find cover.
Vancouver is okay too, a bit more open than Rio, but more enclosed at some areas than London.

[Borklund]

I'll be on later tonight to play some games. I want to beat Platinum damnit!

[ShadowyMOON]

Glad to hear your thoughts on the N7 classes Spectrum, I've yet to unlock them myself. Paladin does seem to be pushing the limits of PUG playability...

[Wizlah]

As an addendum to sceptrum's notes, I picked up the destroyer yesterday, and specced up the grenades for wider impact - seemed to work out okay. For those of you not so good at placing your shots quickly (i.e. me), the Devastator mode combined with a Revenant is pretty awesome, doubly so with either assault rifle gear or warfighter package. You get extra magazine capacity with the devastor mode - at one point on a geth gold run, I just stood there pumping bullets into a prime without being taken down or reloading. It was quite ridiculous. I think as a grenadier using the striker,maybe combined with disruptor or cryo ammo, hooked up next to the new engineer's supply cable, you could lay down a shit load of suppressing fire and staggering explosions for your teammates.

Also, there is only one tune for this class, and the inevitable all destroyer gold run:

[Wizlah]

Whilst grinding WGG, I tried out the destroyer with a couple of different weapon loadouts. Phaeston (with extra mag and armour piercing) +carnifex (extra mag and damage) was a good combo, because I got more regular missiles. that was quite handy, because the phaeston strips a prime's shields nicely with devastator, and then you just plug the fuckers with your carni.

then tried striker (recoil compensator+extra mag) and hurricane (extra mag+ultralight). works well with your grenades, and on the once occasion one of the other engineers had the actual cop to lay down a supply cable next to me (I usually take up the outside position when playing pub WGG), it was a ridiculous proper barrage. Really, a fucking beautifully explosive sight to behold. Hurricane takes down the primes, plus backs you up when you run out of ammo on the striker.