First (and so far only) n7 character I have is the paladin, to which im pretty happy as I was hoping to get that one early on. These are my observations and thoughts so far:
First off light melee produces a shield backhand animation, heavy melee plants the shield and roots your character, you can turn around not move from that spot long as the shield is in use. I have the upgraded shield (about 5k dmg absorbtion or something like that) allowing it to easily soak most standard attacks, phantom blasters and turret fire however phantom melee, atlas melee and atlas rockets instantly break even the upgraded one.
Backhanding enemies with your shield produces a hilarious ragdoll effect as it tosses them several feet away from you, definately worth meleeing people over. One interesting and not readily obvious thing I noticed is you can absorb the damage of grenades , I blocked one at near point blank range during an extraction and while it destroyed the shield no one was injured. (NOTE: having your shield destroyed causes you to stagger, so careful with that.)
On silver at least I also was able to tank nasty amounts of geth primes, hunters and pryos with the help of energy drain. (Drain, pop shield, drain, pop shield. just watch out for stuff sneaking (or being thrown) behind you, overall the paladins lack of ability to move while shielded is a issue but overall im liking the class. I would suggest a longer range weapon to offset your relative lack of ranged abilities, even though at the moment im running around with a pirahna so im a bit of a hyprocrite there but still fun.
(flash freeze notably is pretty mean, basically a cone of frost in front of you that has the same effect as cryo but with the ability to do damage as well so its fully capable of killing off wounded enemies.)
Sync kills still ignore the shield, at least the banshee does.
When you first deploy your shield it creates a smaller version of a tech shield detonation effect, which can apply the cryo/incinerate effect depending on your shield spec, handy stuff. The shield itself is not a perfect defense, be it from lag or code issues sometimes attacks go through the shield with out breaking it or going around it, I think this may be a deployment bug as canceling and using the shield again tends to fix the problem.
Geth Hunter shots do frequintly (if not always) go through paladins shield.
Omni-sheld does NOT stop shields from regenerating like tactical cloak does, instant cover!
Banshee warps can be blocked by the shield, and while you will get the 'spark' animation on you, you do not suffer from the dot effect.
While the omnishield can block the sweep damage caused by a brute, if he parks his fat ass on you it will still hurt alot so dont try this at home, easier just to dodge them safer too.
From what I can tell the 'super out of cover' aggressive enemies such as centurians and marauders will consider you 'behind cover' when you pop your shield, so they wont rush you and if they are in melee range will start backpeddling.
While you cant shoot, use abilities or move while your shield is up, using rolls or powers will instantly drop it, making it easy to tag enemies with your powers then redeploy the shield or pick up said shield in a hurry.
On Snap Freeze: this ability can reach up to 15 meters if speced for it, but it should be noted that its less effective at its furthest ranges, doing less damage and only chilling even unprotected targets.
Gold: Just as viable on gold as silver, however be wary of the omni-shields inability to block geth hunter shots, as on gold youll run into packs of them and being a sitting duck when three of them march up on you is bad.
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Section is a true FAQ, it may have some reduntencies already handled by my original post but this is just for consistency so dont mind those.
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Q: I don't see any biotic abilities, how is this a sentinel class?
A: While its true tradition has dictated that a sentinel be a mix of tech and biotic abilities up to this point, its 'shield' is a analog to the more traditional tech armor but its true the paladin has more in common with a engineer overall with that exception.
Q: What attacks will instantly break a omni-shield regardless of durability?
A: Atlas missile, phantom melee, brute melee and prime melee.
Q: Will the omni-shield prevent sync/instant kills?
A: No,it wont stop a atlas, brute , banshee or phantom from initiating a sync kill. However phantoms traditionaly perform a melee attack before going into the sync kill, this breaks your shield but staggers her giving you time to retreat/blow her face off but dont re-deploy your omnishield.
Q:What is better, light melee or heavy melee?
A: Light melee is faster, as the heavy requires you to plant your shield first then bash, and unlike the light melee of some charaters (cough*geth*cough) It dosnt take a week to hit someone with it more then once, in fact you could in theory bash someone several times in short order but light enemies get punted across the room and shielded enemies tend to crumble to the ground. In my case they are set on fire either way so I enjoy light bashing badies into next week.
Q: Snap Freeze, is that like cryo?
A: Sort of, its a cone oriented ice attack that orients out from your character and can hit enemies up to 15 meters away (when speced for range) and can hit enemies through walls , its also very fast allowing you to hit enemies repeatly in a short amount of time. Also unlike cryo it does damage, in fact at close range its deadly to trooper class enemies, however the farther the target(s) are from the cast point (IE the paladins fists) the less damage it does and the freeze effect lessens (close range is a solid freeze, at its further longer reaches it may only chill the target).
Q: Do I need Incenerate AND snap freeze to create a tech combo?
A: No, the final evolution of your shield mastery gives you the option of adding a fire or frost effect to your shield, which adds not only to the shields defense (IE they hit it they get set on fire/frozen) but also your melee attacks. While the shield apparently can set up a tech combination, it cannot dedonate it. So youll need to set the fire/frost effect with your shield first then dedonate it with the coresponding effect. (incenerate for frost, snap freeze for fire)
Q: What about Energy Drain?
A: Energy drain is imensely useful , not only for draining shields , restoring your own but for tech combos too. Its also extremely handy when faced with geth and this helps to somewhat deal with the paladins inability to block geth hunter plasma shots.
Q: Do I need to stay planted with my shield up all day to be usefull to my team?
A: No, in fact some enemies seem to ignore you if your behind your shield, iv seen geth primes change from targeting me to attacking team mates after I plop my shield down. Your best use is causing alot of greif for multiple enemies or keeping perticularly nasty ones busy, such as blocking a turret or using your shield to eat banshee warp attacks.
Q: What happens when a non-boss enemies comes into direct contact with my shield on its own, rather then being hit as a melee attack?
A: They suffer the effect of your shield masteries final evolution, husks that have been set on fire by this for example will crumple to the ground as if they had been stunned.
Q: Grenades , will these break my shield?
A: Sometimes, you can stand basically point blank at a grenade and as long as its on the outside of your shield it wont hurt you, however it will certainly break your shield. Be wary of display errors, once I ate a grenade that was under me, but from my point of view looked to be in front of me which resulted in instant death.
Q: If my omni-shield is broken, how long do I have to wait to use it again?
A: Once the stagger effect wears off you can immediately re-use your omni shield!
Q: why do I sometimes take damage from enemies in front of me even though I have my shield up?
A: I believe this to be a minor bug that has to do with the deployment of the omni-shield, if this occurs pick it up and plop it down again that usualy fixes things. Just make sure its actually something ahead of you doing the harm, if your being flanked a new shield deployment wont do you a lick of good.
Q: Whats the best weapon for a paladin?
A: Something light enough to allow you to have a fairly high cooldown bonus on your powers, the ability to spam snap freeze and energy drain is invaluable.
Q: what do YOU use?
A: A Paranha X (choke/Shred) and a Phalanx X (Scope/lightweight materials) which with my weith reduction/capacity talents gives me 191% power cooldown. Phalanx and ED work long range, paranha and snap freeze at medium range while paranha and melee attacks are for close up. This however dosn't mean I dont use snap/ED in close range if I feel the need to or the situation calls for it. Phalanx is mostly for softening up guys at the very start of a wave, I dont get much use out of it but its literally weightless so cant complain.
Q: What would you say is the paladins strongest or most useful ability?
A: Snap freeze, being able to hit a group of enemies from behind cover or through their cover is an undeniable asset and the fact that the freeze/chill effect (when speced for it) increase the damage taken by the target is iceing on the cake.
Q: What class(es) are the best partners for a Paladin?
A: While all classes can work well with a paladin, adepts sometimes get their panties in a bunch due to tech detonations eating their biotic setups. Engineers of all types are great beside a paladin, drones are fantastic and disposable companions to the paladin, able to be in the thick of it with minimal upkeep and a paladin can park himself on top of a static turret such as those used by the geth or quarian females to form a nasty combination.
Modifié par Felhand, 21 juillet 2012 - 10:31 .
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