~Just to explain better how the training missions work, are kept fresh, and maintained throughout the game~
(important to note that the VR missions don't replace any of the current in-game content, except the survival tree)
*taken from
this thread.
"Now, this is the only DLC/unique mission I would add that is "new".
It's called Training Room.
Tali (being the brilliant engineer that she is) builds Shepard some VR training equipment so that Shepard can begin training the best team in the galaxy. The equipment is a series of ingenious "blankets" made of a light metal weave and synthetic material that can create stunningly convincing VR worlds and enemies when covering walls. A few electronic crates that simulate the content being displayed through the blankets, that go on the outside of the sheets. The material disperses biotic abilities when hit, so the fabric won't tear. Tech skills and guns are all modded to not activate, as the VR will simulate the effects of omni tools and firearms.
The material blanketing the walls can simulate weather, terrain, and some temperatures, and can create visual illusions that mimic the feeling of great distances.
Tali sets up this in the one area of the ship that is rarely used, but utterly suitable for this sort of set up: the cargo bay. She blankets the walls in the sheets (resembling slightly sparkling cloth sheets that are over lapped together along the interior of the bay) when Shepard wants to set up a VR training session for the entire team. She can also drape them around the Shuttle and Hammerhead, and the boxes of cargo supplies are pushed off to the sides of the bay.
Think of this as the X-Men's training room, but with less material and more innovative construction.
This room serves two major purposes:To build and develop squad banter and relationships, and to allow our NPCs to learn new game play moves through these improved relationships.
I think we all love squad banter and discussion. Here, Shepard has to initially struggle to get his team of bad asses to work together. Some characters like Jacob, Garrus, Tali, Mordin, and Thane are willing to work together. Rivalries spark, egos clash, and disagreements flare with others in the crew.
Miranda always struck me as someone whose genetics, education, and abilities made her rather arrogant. So, during the first level of the VR training room, she is automatically assigned as Shepard's second in command, and, internally desperate to prove her skills, she isn't able to instill the same respect that Shepard squad can, and her fire team "dies" during a failed simulation as a result.
Miranda feuds with Jack (just like usual), and Garrus (who's experience and team building skills rival--even possibly exceeding her own). She can develop respect from/for Garrus depending on her progression through the story, and gain subject Zero's obedience in the sim, but Jack will always hate her (keeping in mind that we can't change the relationship between the two women as ME3 hasn't decided their fates yet).
Miranda's ruthless nature leads her to put "minimal purpose" fighters like Jack, Grunt, and Legion in the front lines as distractions while she is focused on completing the missions.
(this is not to say that these characters have literally no purpose, merely that this is how Miranda values and perceives them in her own mind)
Jack and Grunt aren't willing to take orders from anyone but Shepard at first, and must complete a few of the VR missions with Shepard before they start taking the program and other squad mates seriously.
Zaeed is at first a crazed leader, putting minimal effort into choosing how to use his squad mates, and more effort into killing. Jack and Grunt like this. Other characters hate it, because it means that they are killed completing objectives while the other three go off on rampages.
You can sort of see where this is going. If Miranda is assigned the role of fire team leader enough times, she will gain most of the team's trust, and will be able to lead successful VR runs, gaining both experience for the player, and vocal support from the other characters. Gaining Garrus's support would be very uplifting to her. Same with Zaeed, Thane, Garrus, Tali, and Samara. We'd be able to see these characters not only develop as individuals, but as a crew. Even if they remain professional, it would be great squad banter to see an initial squad go from being a group that argues over mission priorities in the field, to carefully planning out mission priorities later, to finally working like a well oiled machine. Hell, if we wanted to take the VR one step further, they could go from a well oiled machine to a group willing to sacrifice themselves for each other.
There are certain exceptions to the fire team leader rule though. Grunt, Legion, Kasumi, and Jack simply don't have what it takes to be fire team candidates. They'll fulfill other equally important roles in the VR.
Long story short, the better each character does in a VR round, the more experience the player gets, the better rep that character gets, and the more character interaction those characters get.
-When it comes down to abilities/weapons-
Here we get to see more personal relationships between smaller groups of squad mates, that eventually develop abilities and abilities for wider use. Player choice is constantly under the players control, but the pay offs are big.
Shepard can have one on one VR training sessions regarding gun play, biotics, infiltration tactics, or tech abilities (depending on Shepard's class) with squad mates that correspond with those abilities. This allows Shepard to interact with NPCs out of their SR2 rooms, and gain/give new skills and experience.
For instance-
Shepard-Adept and Jack are in the VR room. Jack is teaching you (with generous amounts of profanity) how to boost your LSx abilities even more. Through a series of excersizes, she can teach Shepard how to use more powerful pulls, throws, slams, or singularities.
Samara can teach Jack how having the strongest biotics isn't everything. Accuracy and refinement also make a biotic potent. Jack can scoff, but Samara will demonstrate incredible biotic skill by using her biotics more rapidly than Jack could. Jack then gains a quicker cool down time for her powers.
And so on and so fourth.
In another scene, we can see Thane and Samara philosophizing in the VRs simulated beautiful desert. They then begin to spar, and Samara surprises the assassin by activating a biotic gauntlet, which she can teach Thane. Thane gains a powerful biotic melee attack (to go with his martial arts abilities).
Then we have a scene where Thane is training Samara in the use of sniper rifles, and the Justicar gains the ability to use sniper rifles, giving her a three weapon limit instead of two.
OR
Jacob and Samara train in a VR junk yard world, and Jacob teaches the justicar in shotgun training. Or Samara trains Jacob in biotic attack training. But because Samara learned shotgun training AND sniper training, she can't carry both weapons at the same time, so you'll have to choose what she can carry at the start of missions. Similarly, Jacob now has advanced biotics now, AND assault rifle training from Zaeed, but he can only carry one of these into a mission with him.
(you can swap them up, so that Jacob can have advanced biotics in one mission, and AR training in the next, just never at the same time).
Shepard only, however, can train Legion, Grunt, Garrus, and Jacob in carrying heavy weapons, which can only be activated in-game like a special biotic attack via the scroll wheel (so you'll never get Grunt nuking people left and right).
This way, Samara could potentially train Shepard and Miranda to become a more powerful biotics, making them both eligible to fulfill the role of biotic barrier carrier during the SM. They won't be as strong as Jack or Samara, but Miranda's powers would now rival Kaiden's, and Shepard's would rival those of a long trained Asari commandos.
You can see how this sort of works. It boosts abilities/weapon count, while showing more character interaction.
Heh, imagine a comical scene where Grunt plans to train Jack in gaining a superior melee attack, and she smacks him with a biotic gauntlet that leaves a nasty bruise on his head. The result being that Grunt actually learns to use a stronger melee attack XD
Now, these VR training missions are similar to the Pinnacle station missions. Facing down hordes, securing locations, capturing territories, escorting civilians, infiltration and stealth, etc etc. The difference is that these game play elements come into play during the ME2 story missions, like Feris Fields, where you have to either escort civilians to safety, or face down a seven minute horde of endless collectors.
Also, depending on how good your team is at these VR missions (which they can retake if you're not satisfied with their progress in the VR missions), cutscenes in the SM will be slightly different, as you will have gained another level of loyalty for each character called "professional loyalty". Though completion of a characters loyalty quest ensures their survival, completion of their professional loyalty ensures that they can almost breeze through their roles in the SM. Rather than Samara struggling to keep up her biotic barrier under the seeker swarms, she can periodically cause the field to fluctuate violently, causing enemies outside of the field to take damage-- and ending that section of game play with a cutscene in which she easily makes it to safety, and hurls her biotic attack at Shepard's attackers.
Another example of professional loyalty might be a moment where, instead of having a squaddie calling Shepard to tell him to hurry up and blow up the base, instead getting a scene where you see your specialists utterly slaughtering wave after wave of enemies. Dozens of husks and collectors attacking your final fire team, and your squad creating pyramids of corpses. This is the most dangerous team in the galaxy, right? Wouldn't it be cool to see the combined power of the best mercs, scientists, assassins, and tacticians kicking the collectors asses?
Imagine this comical scene:
Thane, Legion, and Garrus are at a vantage point over the battle. Thane and Garrus are in the middle of a sniping contest, cutting down foe after foe, while Legion, struggling to keep up with them, can't get a shot off. After a snide comment from either the drell or turian, Legion pulls off a ridiculous quadruple headshot (he is a machine after all), and the other two stare dumbfounded momentarily at the geth. That could be a loyalty quest reward."
Modifié par 100k, 27 juillet 2011 - 05:50 .
Retour en haut
. Garrus added far less to the plot than Mordin, in my estimation - he could definitely have been an NPC who simply said "Go see Harkin", and that's how much he added to the plot itself. Wrex and Tali are similar. They definitely added less to the plot than Mordin, and were about on-par with Legion. Liara was like the way less interesting version of Mordin in ME1 (necessary for the plot to go forwards). In ME2's DLC she was amazing.
