42 réponses à ce sujet

[DuskWanderer]

I notice that you asked for team, and no one gave it to you.

When I played through Insanity, in the early game, I rotated James, EDI, and Garrus. The only exception is the rachni mission and Priority: Tuchanka. Do not take EDI for either of those.

After Priority: Citadel II, Kaidan went on rotation. If you have Ashley instead, she also works the same. Don't take Liara or Tali unless you need to. Since you are a soldier and have no biotics, I'd ignore Javik.

[capn233]

The squad largely doesn't matter, especially since every character can detonate tech combos from ammo.

Liara is always a good squadmate because her cooldowns are rapid enough that she can detonate her own biotic combos, and she has Warp to add a nice 15% damage taken penalty to larger targets.

[DuskWanderer]

Eh, Liara's terrible against missions with Reapers (and Cerberus), she dies if a rachni or turret so much as looks at her. The team I took (Soldier, Vanguard, and Engineer Insanity playthroughs) she never stayed alive long enough to really use it.

[capn233]

Liara is one of the best squad mates for any Shepard. She is not all that durable because she is so powerful. All you have to do is use a slight amount of micro and you can keep her alive.

Granted, if you have the Typhoon it makes some squad mates appear to be better than they really are since that gun isn't balanced whatsoever.

[DuskWanderer]

Sorry, capn233, but that's just not the case. Liara is hands down the worst since she requires all that effort other characters don't even need. Time I spend micro-ing Liara is time that, with everyone else, I spend killing bad guys. Kill faster = better, kill safer = better, die less = better.

Thems the breaks, sorry.

[RedCaesar97]

@DuskWanderer:

Respectfully, I disagree with your opinion, as do a lot of other players. Liara, quite frankly, is probably the most useful squadmate in the game. I actually have to go out of my way to NOT use her she is that good.

And in terms of micro-managing her, I micro-manage her as much as every other squadmate in the game: I tell them where to take cover and which enemies to attack/use powers on. Which makes her just as durable as every other squadmate. I typically take point so I take most or all of the fire while my squadmates stay in the back safely out of harm's way. 

[DuskWanderer]

Most useful at dying, perhaps. In terms of micro-management, I do it even less than you, which is to say, I don't do any of it. I don't need to, even on Insanity. At best, I'll tell a squadmate to use a power. Liara dies before that happens.

You're free to say your opinion. I don't agree. I can back it up if need be. There is no way, particularly on Insanity (which I usually play on) that she is good. Hands down, she's actually the worst.

[themikefest]

I did soldier insanity a couple of times. It wasn't too bad.

I always use James and Ashley(when she becomes available). They're mini tanks and don't need to be babysat. They hold their own.

I did an insanity run with the robot and T'soni the whole game and I have to say I would've been better off doing the whole game by myself.

I saw a post about in London facing all the banshees and brutes. After eliminating the Harvester, I would stand behind the telephone booth with the Black Widow shooting the Banshees and when the Marauders get close I use the Mattlock. Surprisingly staying behind the telephone booth made the sequence fairly easy.

[capn233]

DuskWanderer wrote...

Sorry, capn233, but that's just not the case. 

Sorry, but you are dead wrong on this.

By your own admission you aren't managing the squad mates whatsoever, which means you aren't using any of them to their full potential.  Since that is the case, why should I trust your pronouncements on which ones are the most effective?

Liara is easy to keep alive without taking any health bonuses in her passive, and her rapid cooldowns mean she is one of the best at controlling the battlefield.  Pair her with Javik and you get a biotic explosion fest no matter what class Shepard happens to be.  And note that she also has the only biotic detonator with a combo multiplier, and is one of 3 squad members that can apply a global debuff.

[Abraham_uk]

capn233 wrote...

DuskWanderer wrote...

Sorry, capn233, but that's just not the case. 

Sorry, but you are dead wrong on this.

By your own admission you aren't managing the squad mates whatsoever, which means you aren't using any of them to their full potential.  Since that is the case, why should I trust your pronouncements on which ones are the most effective?

Liara is easy to keep alive without taking any health bonuses in her passive, and her rapid cooldowns mean she is one of the best at controlling the battlefield.  Pair her with Javik and you get a biotic explosion fest no matter what class Shepard happens to be.  And note that she also has the only biotic detonator with a combo multiplier, and is one of 3 squad members that can apply a global debuff.

Liara and Javik are a great combination when it comes to biotic explosions.
Kaidan is also a great choice as long as you don't put any points into barrier.

Liara + Javik = good choice
Liara + Kaidan (without barrier) = good choice
Javik + Kaidan (without barrier) = good choice

[DuskWanderer]

capn233 wrote...

DuskWanderer wrote...

Sorry, capn233, but that's just not the case. 

Sorry, but you are dead wrong on this.

By your own admission you aren't managing the squad mates whatsoever, which means you aren't using any of them to their full potential.  Since that is the case, why should I trust your pronouncements on which ones are the most effective?

Liara is easy to keep alive without taking any health bonuses in her passive, and her rapid cooldowns mean she is one of the best at controlling the battlefield.  Pair her with Javik and you get a biotic explosion fest no matter what class Shepard happens to be.  And note that she also has the only biotic detonator with a combo multiplier, and is one of 3 squad members that can apply a global debuff.

You didn't read a word, did you? In that case, why should I try to argue with you. I'll repeat myself, maybe you just missed it. 

I said that I "barely" micro manage the squad, not that I don't manage the squad. Time spent micro-managing the squad, moving them to where they need to go, stopping them to use a power or not, that's all time I could better spend by killing my enemies. While I'm sitting around waiting to prime Liara, Garrus and Ashley have already killed half of the enemies. 

"Best at controlling the battlefield" assigns far too much credit to Liara. You can do that with any biotic detonation, and you only need one of them. The enemies are flying through the air, and there is no "control" at that point, you're mopping up what's left by using Dark Channel (Javik), or Reave (Kaidan), as neither of these fade when detonated, they still do damage, and gunfire with the godly assault rifles. I then have to move to the next battlefield, which takes longer than Kaidan's cooldown times, even with Barrier in use. So why should I assign so much credit to Liara? The only time this doesn't happen are on the geth missions, and tech bursts and Overload are infinitely better on those. 

You say "Liara is easy to keep alive" but more than one person in this topic has mentioned problems, and you provide no details on it. 

I have no idea what you mean by "combo multplier", Warp can only have it's detonation damage increased one time. If you're talking about detonating more than one effect, you are wrong (Lift Grenade, Charge, and Nova can all do this) 

"Global debuff" is nothing special: The extra damage I could get from a squad member with better weapons would more than eclipse that: Liara does the second lowest weapon damage in the game.

I'm providing clear and concise data on why Liara fails. If you seek to contradict me, provide the same.

[cap and gown]

Here we go again. We had this same debate about 2 months ago and it got nowhere. It won't get anywhere this time either, I am sure.

I will say, though, the statement "time spent managing the squad is time not killing the enemy" seems to reveal a lack of awareness of the pause menu, or a simple unwillingness to use it. Either way, this statement can only be true because you choose to make it true, not because the game forces it on you.

Modifié par cap and gown, 22 décembre 2013 - 12:15 .

[capn233]

DuskWanderer wrote...

You didn't read a word, did you? In that case, why should I try to argue with you. I'll repeat myself, maybe you just missed it.

And yet here we are.  Most of the people that post regularly in this sub forum have beaten ME3 multiple times on Insanity.  If there is something that doesn't jive with experience, you are probably going to see someone comment on it.  And it isn't as if I am the only one claiming Liara is one of the better squad members.  Look through the old threads.  You have some people claiming they won't run her because she is too powerful.  She is not a tank, and nobody is claiming she is.  But if you put in effort she is one of the better squad mates.  She is not the worst or least useful, and that would be a minority opinion among ME3 "veterans."

I said that I "barely" micro manage the squad, not that I don't manage the squad. Time spent micro-managing the squad, moving them to where they need to go, stopping them to use a power or not, that's all time I could better spend by killing my enemies. While I'm sitting around waiting to prime Liara, Garrus and Ashley have already killed half of the enemies.

Positioning the squad takes basically a very quick punch of Q and E.  The time it takes to dock them behind cover is minimal in this game since squad AI pathing is pretty decent.  And it isn't like Liara is unique in this regard, the survivability is much higher for every single squadmate if you position them.  This should be readily apparent if you have played through the game multiple times.

Also Ash and Garrus aren't going to be killing half the enemies unless you yourself are doing nearly nothing, especially if you are not giving attack commands because squad members have a huge penalty to weapon damage if you don't order them to attack specific targets, and their management of powers is inefficient if you aren't ordering them yourself.  So either you are ordering Ash and Garrus, in which case it doesn't take any more effort whatsoever to order Liara to use her powers, or you are leaving it to the game in which case you are losing efficiency.

"Best at controlling the battlefield" assigns far too much credit to Liara. You can do that with any biotic detonation, and you only need one of them. The enemies are flying through the air, and there is no "control" at that point, you're mopping up what's left by using Dark Channel (Javik), or Reave (Kaidan), as neither of these fade when detonated, they still do damage, and gunfire with the godly assault rifles. I then have to move to the next battlefield, which takes longer than Kaidan's cooldown times, even with Barrier in use. So why should I assign so much credit to Liara? The only time this doesn't happen are on the geth missions, and tech bursts and Overload are infinitely better on those.

Why are you talking about biotic combos?  That is not how she is controlling the battlefield, it is with a CC power that can ragdoll multiple enemies with a cooldown of sub 4s (Singularity).  How many squad mate powers have a sub 4s cooldown?

She can of course detonate her own biotic combos, which is a bonus.  This is not always practical, but then again it isn't always practical with others either, and it is much easier when her priming power has such a fast cooldown.  Javik needs to Pull into Slam, or use Lift Grenades.  The latter incidentally only detonates combos if it is hitting health.

You say "Liara is easy to keep alive" but more than one person in this topic has mentioned problems, and you provide no details on it.

I don't need to write a treatise on this topic because it is simple.  Put her in cover.  Done.  If you can't be bothered to do that, don't cry to me that she is dying.  She is not durable because she has one of the best skillsets for every single mission in the game.  Squad management has been a component of the Mass Effect series since the beginning, you should not be surprised if you are penalized for ignoring it.

I have no idea what you mean by "combo multplier", Warp can only have it's detonation damage increased one time. If you're talking about detonating more than one effect, you are wrong (Lift Grenade, Charge, and Nova can all do this)

SMH... Look at Rank 4 - Detonate.  That is what I am talking about.  Read up on combo mechanics if you don't understand why that matters.  Saying it is only increased one time doesn't make much sense... it adds a 1.5x multiplier in the combo damage calculation, which typically is more significant than the actual combo rank.  Also note that as I said there aren't any other decent biotic detonators available to other squad members with a detonate bonus.  The only other one with a detonate bonus at all is Slam, and it doesn't detonate on targets with Shields, Barriers, or Armor (which is a handicap that is not shared by Warp).

"Global debuff" is nothing special: The extra damage I could get from a squad member with better weapons would more than eclipse that: Liara does the second lowest weapon damage in the game.

This is just incorrect.  Shepard does the vast majority of weapon damage regardless of who is in the squad.  Add to the fact that you are buffing all power and weapon damage taken from any source, it should be apparent why this matters.

Modifié par capn233, 22 décembre 2013 - 02:40 .

[Locutus_of_BORG]

cap and gown wrote...

I will say, though, the statement "time spent managing the squad is time not killing the enemy" seems to reveal a lack of awareness of the pause menu, or a simple unwillingness to use it. Either way, this statement can only be true because you choose to make it true, not because the game forces it on you.

Even if you didn't use the pause menu, controlling squadmates' in real time with Q, E and the number bar hardly cuts into a player's 'killing time.'

[DuskWanderer]

 

And yet here we are.  Most of the people that post regularly in this sub forum have beaten ME3 multiple times on Insanity.  If there is something that doesn't jive with experience, you are probably going to see someone comment on it.  And it isn't as if I am the only one claiming Liara is one of the better squad members.  Look through the old threads.  You have some people claiming they won't run her because she is too powerful.  She is not a tank, and nobody is claiming she is.  But if you put in effort she is one of the better squad mates.  She is not the worst or least useful, and that would be a minority opinion among ME3 "veterans."

Considering that there are people who make claims about Indoctrination Theory, I find it's not necessarily prudent to accept a poster's comment at face value. It's quite all right to say something happens different when it doesn't: That's the way people learn. 

Positioning the squad takes basically a very quick punch of Q and E.  The time it takes to dock them behind cover is minimal in this game since squad AI pathing is pretty decent.  And it isn't like Liara is unique in this regard, the survivability is much higher for every single squadmate if you position them.  This should be readily apparent if you have played through the game multiple times.

This goes right back to what I said: Now that Liara is sitting around, running to cover, she's not shooting. She's not killing. That's time I could be spend killing. Call me crazy, but I tend to rank how useful and effective the characters are in a shooter by how well they kill things.  Even if Liara spent, say, 3 seconds going to cover, with the rest of the squad, they've killed maybe two guys apiece. 

BTW, I play on 360

Also Ash and Garrus aren't going to be killing half the enemies unless you yourself are doing nearly nothing, especially if you are not giving attack commands because squad members have a huge penalty to weapon damage if you don't order them to attack specific targets, and their management of powers is inefficient if you aren't ordering them yourself.  So either you are ordering Ash and Garrus, in which case it doesn't take any more effort whatsoever to order Liara to use her powers, or you are leaving it to the game in which case you are losing efficiency.

No, it isn't. Ordering your squadmates to attack is tap up on the screen. I can do it with one hand. Ordering a squadmate to use a power is opening the menu, cursoring over to the right power, and selecting. It's the difference between <1 second and maybe 2 or 3 seconds. Small? Assuredly. But it adds up. Further, we're comparing the squadmates, not Shepard. What does Shepard have to do with it?

Why are you talking about biotic combos?  That is not how she is controlling the battlefield, it is with a CC power that can ragdoll multiple enemies with a cooldown of sub 4s (Singularity).  How many squad mate powers have a sub 4s cooldown?

When I can end a battle in under 4 seconds, that's what makes it not useful. It doesn't matter how fast Liara's charge times are if, by the time she is ready for another one, the battle is over and there are no targets. The only times the enemies last longer than that are enemies that can't be lifted by Singularity (Brutes, Banshees, Primes, Atlases, Dragoons) So yes, I agree, she's quite nice against mooks. So is the Typhoon. 

She can of course detonate her own biotic combos, which is a bonus.  This is not always practical, but then again it isn't always practical with others either, and it is much easier when her priming power has such a fast cooldown.  Javik needs to Pull into Slam, or use Lift Grenades.  The latter incidentally only detonates combos if it is hitting health.

Far more than you think, actually, at least with Kaidan and Javik. Detonating combos by yourself is not really practical (for anyone) but detonating the combos, period? Reave and Dark Channel, their two best skills, continue to do damage even when they've been detonated. That's the best part of using them to do it. In addition to controlling the battlefield by knocking the enemies here and there, they are still beating eaten. You can move on to other targets and let that skill do the work. 

SMH... Look at Rank 4 - Detonate.  That is what I am talking about.  Read up on combo mechanics if you don't understand why that matters.  Saying it is only increased one time doesn't make much sense... it adds a 1.5x multiplier in the combo damage calculation, which typically is more significant than the actual combo rank.  Also note that as I said there aren't any other decent biotic detonators available to other squad members with a detonate bonus.  The only other one with a detonate bonus at all is Slam, and it doesn't detonate on targets with Shields, Barriers, or Armor (which is a handicap that is not shared by Warp).

I understood that just fine, why you're whining about it is beyond me. You said "multiple" I said "it only multiples once" and was confused. That's utterly irrelevant in the larger scheme of things, it's not as much extra damage as you'd get with the additional damage from Kaidan/Javik's skill, and the Typhoon.

As for detonators...yeah, you're right, Kaidan and Javik don't get them. I concede that. that's not enough of a point considering I get extra damage from their skills, and more biotic power to make them stronger. 

I don't need to write a treatise on this topic because it is simple.  Put her in cover.  Done.  If you can't be bothered to do that, don't cry to me that she is dying.  She is not durable because she has one of the best skillsets for every single mission in the game.  Squad management has been a component of the Mass Effect series since the beginning, you should not be surprised if you are penalized for ignoring it.

A.) Did that, she still dies. What else have you got? 
B.) The sheer fact that I don't have to do that with anyone else should tell you something about how ineffective Liara is. 

This is just incorrect.  Shepard does the vast majority of weapon damage regardless of who is in the squad.  Add to the fact that you are buffing all power and weapon damage taken from any source, it should be apparent why this matters.

Compare it side by side, friend. Warp does 415 damage over ~13 seconds (Base 400. 75% of Warp is done initially, while the last 25% gets the damage boost. @5% of 400 is 100, 15% of that is 15) Reave does 190 per second for 8 seconds, a total of 1520. That's almost four times as powerful in nearly half the time. Not to mention Warp takes ~6 seconds to recharge, Reave takes ~9, so recharge speed won't make up the difference. And Kaidan uses an assault rifle while Liara doesn't. Are you actually doing to sit there and say that Shepard's bonus weapon damage from Expose (not his total damage) will make up that difference?

It won't. All the pro-Liara rhetoric in the world can't beat the numbers.

[capn233]

It is Christmas Eve, I don't feel like writing "Mass Effect Gameplay and Mechanics" tonight. I will cover some of the highlights though.

You are vastly overestimating how long it takes to put Liara into cover, and how difficult or time consuming it is to order her to use her powers. I would also point out that I have no particular difficulty keeping Liara alive in every single encounter of every single mission in this game. Some are a bit harder than others, but it is more than possible in all of them. I would agree that many times other squadmates require less babysitting, but most of them do not add as much value to the squad.

Too much of your argument is basically just "Typhoon." Nevermind that even if I grant you that the Typhoon is overpowered, Liara is still better than every other non-AR squadmate. Saying that she is the worst is even more absurd than using the Typhoon as the biggest criteria for ranking the squadmates.

Half of the classes can't detonate biotic explosions, including Soldier (which is the class this thread is about). Liara detonating her own biotic explosions does add value to a Soldier's squad.

I never wrote that Warp had multiple bonuses to detonation. It always said "combo multiplier," and it says it with correct spelling and everything. You continually discount the 1.5x multiplier to BE damage from warp in comparison to BE's involving powers that do not have a combo multiplier.

Are you actually doing to sit there and say that Shepard's bonus weapon damage from Expose (not his total damage) will make up that difference?

That should be patently obvious.

Expose grants a 15% power and weapon damage from all sources. So it can be more than made up by the other squadmate and Shepard. Expose lasts 10s, and you can fire the Claymore 9 times w/ reload canceling in that period. With a poor Claymore I and no damage bonuses you get an extra 1800 damage from firing that Claymore alone while Expose is on target. It becomes more pronounced when you are also using powers and you get more weapon damage bonuses.

Additionally, Shepard does the bulk of the weapon damage. This follows from the mechanics. Squad members have a 0.3x multiplier to base weapon damage, but can get a temporary "200%" additive weapon damage bonus if they are ordered to attack a specific target (10s). Garrus and Ashley both have evolutions that are base damage multipliers (their AR and SR evolutions), but even so 1.6 * 0.3 is still less than 1.0. Kaidan, Vega and Javik have mediocre additive weapon damage bonuses.

[billpickles]

Wow, how did I miss the delicious drama in this thread?  Nice!

Dusk Wanderer...
I'm among those who think Liara can be just a bit overrated on this forum at times, and that James tends to be underrated.  However, I still have to say that Liara is undeniably powerful.  Quite frankly, there are just SO MANY unshielded mooks in the SP campaign, and Liara can disable whole groups of them every 2 seconds or so.  For a biotic Shepard, you can produce far more BEs with Liara than anyone else.  And since enemies tend to spawn in clusters or approach from one entrance, it's easy to lock several down at once with a Singularity.  Mooks floating in the air aren't shooting back at you, and that is useful for any Shepard, regardless of class, bonus power, or who the 3rd squaddie might be.

This goes right back to what I said: Now that Liara is sitting around, running to cover, she's not shooting. She's not killing. That's time I could be spend killing. Call me crazy, but I tend to rank how useful and effective the characters are in a shooter by how well they kill things.  Even if Liara spent, say, 3 seconds going to cover, with the rest of the squad, they've killed maybe two guys apiece.

I think part of the issue is that you are equating usefulness with shooting and/or killing.  Liara doesn't need fire a single shot or kill a single enemy on her own to massively increase the survivability and damage potential of the squad.  Singularity for mooks, Warp for bosses.  Stasis for Phantoms.  That's all she needs to do to be one of the most useful squadmates.

Modifié par billpickles, 25 décembre 2013 - 04:52 .

[DesioPL]

Mostly my squad looks that.

Cerberus - Garrus and Liara.(Or in other case Javik) Until i will not have Tali.

Reapers - Liara and Javik, because both have good use of thier powers against reapers.

Geth - Garrus and Tali would be perfect.