My goal here is to teach you the ways of being a proper Drell Vanguard -- no silly cheesing tactics need apply -- on the highest difficulty. To that end, I have produced a video of some notable successes. These clips were all taken from 5 successful Platinum games on 4 different maps. If there's anything I miss in this guide, go with what you see there.
Drell Vanguard on Platinum highlight reel.
Oh, and for the sake of clarity, 100% of that video was off-host. Some of it was while experiencing considerable lag as well. It was also done partially on a map with few grenades and alongside other grenade users. This can be done anytime, anywhere. So let's get to the meat of it:
Why Drell Vanguard?
Space ninja. Space trenchcoat. Space pecs. Space Awesome.
Knowing your role is half the battle.
Drell assassins are trained from birth to kill quickly and efficiently. They are not trained to stand around getting shot. If you like duking it out mano-e-mano with Geth Primes, stop reading and go play a Krogan. A Drell is a fast-moving killer for cleaning house on the little guys: Phantoms, Nemeses, Engineers, Marauders, Ravagers. If there's a Banshee after you, run right past her and on to the next target -- it's a waste of time to go after her.
"Speed is life. You go slow, you die."
The higher movement speed of the Drell isn't just for show. Enemies cannot track your character at a particularly high rate -- you can sidestep quite a lot of bullets just by moving left or right. This is especially obvious when sprinting laterally relative to your opponent -- you frequently won't get hit at all. In any case, you shouldn't ever stop moving. As soon as you land from a Charge, you should be moving some direction relative to your opponent. You can even go right past turrets and watch them struggle to find you, as occurred in the video. To stand still as a Drellguard is to invite death.
You also shouldn't decide that you're finished at some point and would like to sit down for a nap. The Drell Vanguard cannot afford to get swarmed because he lazily waited for the entire map to converge on his position. To succeed as a Drell Vanguard, you have to continue to push forward, seeking opportunities at every turn. If you find your opponent alone, fresh meat. If you find them in a group, they're about to be coated in a layer of Extra Crispy and launched into space. A Drell Assassin fears nothing.
Cover is for wusses.
This one should be a no-brainer. Cover is pointless. It makes you slow, it locks you in place, it lets enemies come to you. You should only use cover in very, very few situations where you need to wait for your cooldown without getting shot by the far-away opponent you're about to Charge. If you're in cover for an extended period of time, you had damn well better be in a hack or escort circle. Instead of entering cover, use walls and edges to your advantage. Strafe to get in position to shoot -- your movement speed will keep you from getting shot up too quickly. If you're in a position where you're staying in one place trading fire, it's probably time to leave.
Idle hands are the assassin's playthings.
Wouldn't it be a good idea to punch somebody with them? Yes, of course it is! Heavy melee should never be forgone. You can use it, with proper timing, to stagger-lock threatening opponents, like Hunters and Phantoms. You can also use it to knock unshielded ones completely out of the fight, to keep enemies off you while you reload, and to deliver extra damage during your weapon fire delay. Bonus points: properly played, you can hide a reload inside a heavy melee.
Turnabout is fair play.
Charge staggers. Cluster Grenades stagger (and they stagger absolutely everything due to their insane amount of force). Heavy Melee staggers. Put to good use what your opponents so cheaply use against you. Don't let your opponent get a shot in edgewise. Just keep plowing into them with Charge, grenades, shots, explosions, and melee. The less they shoot back, the easier it is for you to kill them and the harder it is for them to slow you down.
Get good at handball.
The one major skill that every decent Drellguard must have is the ability to place grenades where he wants them. Cluster grenades are primarily close-range tools -- you don't usually want to toss them across the map. Instead, you bounce a couple off the wall so that they land where you want them. It's terribly easy once you get used to how they bounce. Don't try to bounce them off the ground very frequently -- the bounce is quite significant and they won't detonate for several seconds. Additionally, they do not spread out much at close range, so you can hit enemies in the face with them if you're close enough.
The Way of Damage Resistance.
Drell Vanguards are squishy. They have the lowest base barrier in the game. To accommodate this, you must make proper use of damage resistance bonuses. You get a 50% list damage bonus after Charging, and you get a list 50% damage resistance bonus when you dodge. These together are 100% list damage resistance, which is a real 75% damage resistance -- an effective 4x increase in effective health and shields. After charging and dodging, a properly-equipped Drellguard will have a respectable 3300 effective barrier for the duration -- and you'll probably escape a few hits while you're at it. Simply charging at all gives you 1320 effective barrier. This is part of why you must Charge frequently: that bonus damage resistance wears off after 4 seconds and you're effectively taking at least 60% more damage.
The first rule of Drellgod is...
...you do not take Pull. It's a waste to spec. Pull has no synergy with the Drellguard's kit. Any time spent not charging is time spent dying. 12.5% weapon damage is far more valuable than 3 points in Pull, and speccing Pull fully is an even bigger waste of valuable skill points. You will not set up biotic explosions with Pull on Platinum. Even if you wanted to do so, the Drell Adept would be a superior choice for the task. Even with the massive buffs that Pull has received, this one is to be left to the dogs.
(I know I had pull specced 3 points in the video. Do as I say, not as I do. I did not touch the power once in the 5 matches that made up that video.)
Life's important questions.
Building is a Drellguard is generally pretty straightforward, though there are a few spots where you might want to customize your Drellguard. Here is my breakdown of the powers:
Biotic Charge: Rank 4 and rank 6 are a given. At rank 5, both are decent options: weapon-lovers might want weapon damage, grenade-spammers will take power damage. I tend to prefer power damage in part because I spam grenades and in part because of the longer bonus. Power damage will allow you to continue to get the grenade damage bonus for some time, and you're much more likely to get extra bonus damage on your next Charge. However, neither is a "wrong" choice here as you will rely on both guns and grenades no matter how you spec.
Cluster Grenade: Rank 4 should generally go to damage unless you're really having trouble hitting your target. Rank 5 should always be Extra Grenades (you don't have Pull),
Drell Assassin: I recommend power damage and capacity at rank 4. Even if you're going for weapon damage focus, you have to take one of the two power damage bonuses to stagger Phantoms reliably, and this one also lowers your cooldowns. At rank 5, choose whichever suits your style -- I went for power damage here as well as I toss a lot of grenades.
Fitness: Hello, Captain Obvious! Oh, you want me to spec shields and only shields? Why, I would never have guessed. Thank you!
This is my own preferred build.
Happiness is a piping-hot shotgun.
There's really only one weapon class that is of value to a Drell Vanguard, and that's a shotgun. You aren't going to snipe enemies from afar -- neither of your powers are good for that -- and you aren't going to sit behind cover with an assault rifle. Your job is to pounce on your opponent and tear him to shreds like a the vicious ninja lizard you are.
There are a few notable weapons here. I will first address my own weapon of choice, the Wraith. The Wraith is light and has very good damage per shot. It has the weakness, however, of having a very slow rate of fire. This is less of a weakness than it might seem, however. In between shots, you should throw grenades and use heavy melee. All told, the damage output is pretty good, and the weapon is versatile. However, it is an ultra-rare, and you might not have it at a good level. Another popular choice is the N7 Piranha, which trades per-shot damage and accuracy for DPS. It is a good choice as well, but comes with the disadvantage of needing a smart choke to be practical (which costs either 25% weapon damage or 50% cooldown). It also doesn't have a long fire delay in which to hide other attacks, so any other moves are lost DPS. Some players use the Claymore. It is a good weapon, but very unforgiving and rather heavy. I find it hard to use on Platinum due to the big cooldown hit -- 50% longer, or more than 1.5s. The Talon is another popular choice: it has good DPS, decent range when aiming down the sights, and gets 50% greater damage versus shields and barriers. It's also fairly light even at lower levels, making it decent even at level 1. However, it does not have the space in between shots to use heavy melee or dodge, and the reload-canceled reload duration is longer (i.e. ammo shows up later in the reload animation). It also has the issue of being a pistol, which means that the Shock Trooper gear would not be worthwhile; other gear would have to be used instead. Finally, I highly recommend avoiding the Reegar Carbine. It is a powerful weapon, but it slows your movement and has a 0.25s charge-up time before it fires. You can cheese corners with it pretty effectively, but I'm deliberately avoiding that in this guide. Weaksauce tactics are weak.
Three other, less popular options are the Geth Plasma Shotgun, the Raider, and the Graal Spike Thrower. The Geth Plasma Shotgun has highly-reliable stagger, ignores shieldgating, ignores armor damage reduction, and can be charged for flattening opponents as soon as you see them. As etm125 rightfully pointed out, the weapon can also be charged (or the charged shot released) while dodging, meaning you never stop gaining damage potential while dodging. However, it cannot pierce cover or Guardian shields, cannot get headshots, and is a projectile that is subject to lag. It's still a very good weapon, however, especially if you spec for grenades. It also certainly never needs a backup as it is all-range. The AT-12 Raider is a cross between the Piranha and Claymore. It has two shots rather than one, but ultimately puts out truckloads of burst DPS. The drawback is that it, like the Piranha, is highly inaccurate, and if you brought a high-velocity barrel, it would be as heavy as the Claymore. I personally don't find it worth the weight on this class. The Graal Spike Thrower is like the Geth Plasma Shotgun, with higher risk and higher reward. It can get headshots, and gets superior headshot damage from them (3x instead of 2.5x damage). If you're a crack shot, this thing will absolutely flatten enemies. However, it has 6 smaller projectiles with no homing ability, which makes it very, very difficult to use off host. Given how much risk a Drell Vanguard already assumes, this one is a niche weapon.
You might also want a backup. I highly recommend avoiding heavier options here -- they just aren't worthwhile. I carry an Acolyte with ULM mod, which comes in at 10% weight. Other options are the Hurricane, Hornet, and Phalanx. If you took the pistol weight reduction instead of 12.5% weapon damage in the class skill (why you would do that, I do not know), then a Carnifex, Paladin, or Scorpion with ULM mod are appropriate low-weight options as well. Otherwise, I find 30% cooldown to be wasteful for a weapon you all but never use. If you brought the Talon, you have no backup option but an SMG. The longest-range SMG is the Collector SMG; the Locust is a mediocre stand-in if you do not have the CSMG. If you want a general-purpose other weapon in case you run out of ammo, it's probably the Hornet or Hurricane with stability mod.
It has been noted that when not carrying any DLC weapons, the weight penalty from a High Velocity Barrel may not apply. This will allow you to to carry a Wraith with a Smart Choke and HVB without suffering any cooldown penalty. Feel free to make good use of this bug while it lasts.
Always come prepared.
Shock Trooper should be your go-to gear. Grenade Capacity is OK as well, but I find that I've always got plenty of Thermal Clip Packs on hand anyway. If you chose the Talon as a weapon, you will have to use either the Grenade Capacity gear or the Commando Package, sacrificing either grenade capacity or weapon damage. For equipment, your path is clear: you need Cyclonics to survive, you need Incendiary Ammo to set off fire explosions, and you won't benefit from anything else so much as a weapon amp. Some have suggested that an Adrenaline Module would be a good alternative to Cyclonics, using the faster motion to avoid more enemy attacks by strafing past them. I personally have found using Cyclonics and damage resistance mechanics to be more effective, but if you can make Adrenaline mods work, more power to you.
Oh, and speaking of which, don't forget the Incendiary Ammo under any circumstance. Fire Explosions are great for melting armor, and the high damage you get from the ammo power really pays off. Prime enemies as frequently as possible and then use Charge or Cluster Grenades to set off the explosion. Got a biotic teammate? Each of your Cluster grenades will set off another explosion, so you can set off multiple explosions in one toss if the opponent is properly primed for each.
Other tips and tricks.
-Your reload animation can be hidden in any other attack with an animation. That includes Charge and heavy melee. I haven't ever seen it happen with a grenade toss, but that also may be possible.
-Most sync-killers have a tell on the sync kill. Banshees can only sync kill while charged and teleporting around; Phantoms, Scions, and Atlas mechs have to melee first; Brutes do the chest-pound; and I have no idea what Praetorians do because they're stupidly overpowered. If their tell is lost (e.g. the Atlas shoots again after melee), they will have to use the setup a second time before they can sync kill. Use that to take on Atlas mechs when the need arises.
-You cannot be sync-killed by an opponent who is at a different elevation than you. Engaging Banshees on stairs is a good strategy you have seen me employ in the video.
-Sync killing takes time. You can safely go right into melee range on Phantoms and Brutes if you toss grenades first. Having 2000N force on your grenades is useful.
-Never forget that you can dodge immediately out of Charge. You'll really want this against Brutes and areas covered by Ravager acid.
-You're invincible for up to 1 second while charging. If you absolutely must attack a Turret, try to let it start shooting first, and move past it when you land. If you don't, it might catch up to you and finish you from the other side.
Modifié par Gamemako, 14 novembre 2012 - 06:49 .
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play him.
