81 réponses à ce sujet

[senojones]

UPDATE - added damage values (based on the research of others, subject to change if required).
www.gamefaqs.com/computer/doswin/file/944906/58941
social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/128/index/1143264

The Infiltrator class is built around the concept of any type of sniper/stealth character, you can benefit from your enviroment to avoid damage and use your long range capability to keep a large gap between your targets. An Infiltrator also specalizes in weaponry, where a player with good aim can gain great benefit. If you end up in a situation that feels too close for your own comfort then you have the ability to stealth from view to find cover in a more safe spot and use this for a huge bonus damage. You also have the flexability of choosing any type of teammate, letting you specialize each mission with friends that benefit you most against a specific type of enemy.

Armor
Required: These will be armor pieces that I personally believe are required if you want to get the most out of your Infiltrator, these will help strengthen the strongest parts of your fighting experience.

Kuwashii Visor - Increases headshot damage by 10%
Off-Hand Ammo Pack - Increase spare ammo capacity by 10%

Non-required: These will be armor pieces that can be determined by your own personal opinion, but I will list my own for anyone interested.

Capacitor Chestplate - Reduces the delay before your shields start regenerating by 10%
N7 Shoulder Guards - Increases weapon damage by 3%
Ordnance Packs - Increase spare heavy weapon ammo by 10%


Special weapon selection
Required: When you reach the mission to search a Collector ship, you will be givin three options of weapon selection, shotgun/assault rifle training or the Widow sniper. There should be no question in your choice, Widow is without a doubt the most powerful weapon an Infiltrator can use, capable of killing insanity level enemies with one headshot. Most people might be concerned about the ammo capacity, but the Widow is the highest single shot damage of any standard weapon and most heavy weapons (some could even consider the Widow as a heavy weapon). At the insanity level there will be a very high ammount of enemies with armor, this type of defense is the Widows largest strength, capable of taking large chunks away from even the toughest enemies.

Widow Anti-Material Rifle:
- Ammo Capacity = 1/12 (default), 1/13 (Off-hand Ammo Pack)
- 50% stronger against armor.
- Base Damage = 368.3 (552.5 vs. armor)
- Headshot Damage (assuming double damage, subject to change) = 736.6 (1105 vs. armor)
- Base DPS = HP: 156 / armor: 234 / shield: 156 / barrier: 156
- Reload Time - 1.5 seconds

FULLY UPGRADED: 50% stronger vs. armor / 50% increased headshot damage / 50% increased damage
- 75% stronger against armor
- Base Damage = 552.5 (966.9 vs. armor)
- Headshot Damage (subject to change) = 1105 (2417.3 vs. armor)
- Base DPS = HP: 234 / armor: 410 / shield: 234 / barrier: 234

NOTES:
- I haven't found any exact data on headshot damage bonus, so I am assuming 100% base damage increase, if I am incorrect with this value please let me know so I can correct it.
- If you spot some incorrect numbers in my math, please let me know the correct value.

Talents
Required: There isn't much room for unique talent builds, altho it may be possible to do so it will end up making your fighting capability harder than it should be. AI Hacking/Cryo Ammo are both very weak when compared to your other options, it is recommended to avoid putting points into either of these talents. The talent selection below will make your Infiltrator deadly against every defense type without interupting your power cooldown choices of either Incinerate or Cloak.

Disruptor Ammo - 4/4 (Heavy) - Shield/Synthetic Damage: 60% Weapon Damage, Synthetic Overload Duration: 3 seconds, Weapon Overload Duration: 6 seconds
Tactical Cloak - 4/4 (Assassination) - Bonus Damage: 75%, Cooldown: 6 seconds, Duration: 6 seconds (NOTE: Cooldown wont begin until your cloak duration ends or broken from the use of weapon fire)
Incinerate - 4/4 (Heavy) - Damage: 210 over 3 seconds, Cooldown: 6 seconds, Radius: 1.2 meters (NOTE: Damage will be 2.4 times the normal ammount against armor and will permanently stop health regeneration, also the base cooldown can be lowered from research and passive talents)
Operative - 4/4 (Agent) - Health: 20%, Weapon Damage: 9%, Power Recharge: 15%, Power Duration: 15%, Sniper Slowdown: 50% (2 second duration), Paragon/Renegade: 100% bonus

Bonus Talent: This can be an option that is subject to many personal opinions, but will be restricted to passive ammo types because of the large benefit of using your power cooldown for either Incinerate or Cloak. I personally believe Warp Ammo is the overall best choice, it will strengthen your weapon power against the one type of defense an Infiltrator lacks (barriers) and give you extra benefit to your strongest defense type (armor). The concept is fairly simple, SMG is very effective against shields/barriers and has great synergy with Disruptor/Warp Ammo; Widow is extremely effective against armor and has great synergy with Warp Ammo. There is also the extra benefit from a damage bonus to enemies effected by biotics. Some will argue AP Ammo as their bonus talent due to the 20% increased damage to health/armor, but honestly  it is overkill to a defense the infiltrator class doesn't need at the cost of losing the benefit against barriers and bonus damage on targets effected by biotics.

Warp Ammo: 4/4 (Heavy) - Health/Armor/Barrier Damage: 50% Weapon Damage (NOTE: Damage is increased on targets effected by biotics)

Infiltrator Tips

- Conserve your Widow ammo, you don't want to be caught in a situation where you are out of sniper ammo against a tougher enemy.
- Use sniper zoom to your advantage, slowing down the tempo of combat can let you be more accurate in targetting, headshots are important.
- Use your flexable party selection to your advantage, each mission will usually have a specific type of enemy defense. Pick a party that has a great synergy with yourself and eachother.
- Miranda is a great overall character that has a lot of synergy with the Infiltrator class; 15% party weapon damage, Warp for armor/barriers, Crippling Slam for Warp Ammo bonus damage.
- Grunt is great for dealing with Husks; this type of enemy tends to overwhelm you with their numbers and added armor defense on insanity, Grunt will take advantage of this with his charge ability and massive health regeneration.
- Use your cloak as much as possible when dealing with mid/long range situations, the bonus can make a huge difference in your Widow damage and ammo efficiency. If you feel overwhelmed at some point, save your cloak cooldown for a safe escape.
- Use Incinerate as often as possible against armor targets or enemies with health regeneration, it can make a huge difference in crippling an enemies defense and will conserve ammo. Also use Incinerates unique curving ability to your advantage, it can help significantly against enemies out of your line of sight (which happens often on insanity).
- SMG + Assassination Cloak + Agent = huge DPS against any enemies in range.  Also try to use SMG against any target in range with a barrier or shield, it will destroy either type of defense and help conserve your sniper ammo.
- Dont be afraid to melee if stuck in close combat against weaker enemies, it can help in conserving ammo and can do some heavy damage when fully upgraded + used with cloak.
- Whenever you find an enemy with a flamethrower, always try to aim for the containers located on their back. If successful you will see a stream of fire for a few seconds, followed by a large explosion that will kill the target and heavily damage any enemies in range.

Problems + Bugs + Concerns: These are issues I've personally come across while playing, feel free to comment on your own and I might add them to this list.

- Using Incinerate from a cover position with your sniper rifle equiped will result in using your sniper zoom, altho this really isn't a major issue it can be fairly annoying when you constantly need to deal with the un-needed 50% slowdown time.
- Why no assault rifle option? (without the cost of losing Widow) It always seemed silly to me since an infiltrator can use both a SMG and sniper rifle. The soldier class can still have the unique assault rifle, but it would be nice to have the basic types as an infiltrator.
- AI Hacking + Cryo Ammo are both very weak talents when compared to the rest, they could both use some tweaking to favor more diverse and unique talent choices.
- Is there a way to bind weapons to specific keys? Due to the delay of swapping between weapons it can be fairly annoying when cycling with the next/previous weapon binding option (you can actually tap your 'next weapon' bind to skip a weapon selection, but even that seems unnessessary).

Modifié par senojones, 14 février 2010 - 10:18 .

[Atmosfear3]

-Assuming you max a total of 5 skills, you'll still have one point left over to spend. AI hacking, even with 1 point is the best choice really since it makes fighting synthetics almost trivial. You can also turn heavy mechs against your enemies, although not for long, it will take them out of the fight since hacked synthetics don't fire on you.

-I disagree with choosing heavy disruptor ammo over squad disruptor. I had heavy disruptor myself but saw it pointless since I was in cover most of the time due to heavy damage from enemies. Miranda is a champ on my squad when it comes to taking down enemy shields. This is extremely advantageous especially during that mission where you must protect crates from 3 heavy mechs.

-That issue with incinerate causing the time-dilation when equipped with a sniper rifle only occurs if you are shooting that incinerate from behind cover. If you're just standing in the open you won't experience the time-dilation.

-The default N7 chest (I forget the name, but its the first one on the list) is probably the better choice as its been stated by BW devs that power damage bonuses affect ammo as well.

-Operative (Assassin) is the better choice here imo. Better scope-in time dilation damage and duration, more weapon damage and power damage.



I think AP vs Warp ammo is highly debatable. Personally I used AP ammo the entire length of the game until the suicide mission where I knew I was going to encounter collectors with barriers. I admit the first encounter on the disabled collector ship was pretty difficult but frankly, armored enemies are the toughest to take down as armor is often the hardest defense to strip. Shields and barriers are fairly easy as even a stock SMG can easily cut through.

[Sfox1989]

Great guide

[senojones]

Assuming you max a total of 5 skills, you'll still have one point left over to spend. AI hacking, even with 1 point is the best choice really since it makes fighting synthetics almost trivial. You can also turn heavy mechs against your enemies, although not for long, it will take them out of the fight since hacked synthetics don't fire on you.

This is so situational, and is barely worth the power cooldown. You also can't turn heavy mechs until you break through their defense, which makes it even less useful. Granted this leftover talent point is worth putting into AI hacking over Cryo Ammo, but you still should rarely ever want to use this over other options.

I disagree with choosing heavy disruptor ammo over squad disruptor. I had heavy disruptor myself but saw it pointless since I was in cover most of the time due to heavy damage from enemies. Miranda is a champ on my squad when it comes to taking down enemy shields. This is extremely advantageous especially during that mission where you must protect crates from 3 heavy mechs.

Uh what? Granted you are spending a lot of time in cover but that's still no excuse, you should gain the most benefit out of either of your teammates. If you are capable of decent aim, then you should have no problem exposing yourself for a couple of seconds when you see an opening between enemy fire. Not to mention any type of long range situation against Geth, you should be dropping targets constantly with your Widow + Disruptor Ammo. This is a personal preference argument, so if you are willing to lose 20% weapon damage for the sake of your team then that's your choice.

That issue with incinerate causing the time-dilation when equipped with a sniper rifle only occurs if you are shooting that incinerate from behind cover. If you're just standing in the open you won't experience the time-dilation.

Thanks, that's more specific, but considering you spend the majority of your combat behind cover, it still makes this very annoying.

The default N7 chest (I forget the name, but its the first one on the list) is probably the better choice as its been stated by BW devs that power damage bonuses affect ammo as well.

I specifically stated that this armor piece is subject to personal opinion, you are comparing 3% power damage vs. 10% reduced delay on shield recharge. 3% power damage effects your ammo talents, which is so small you wouldn't ever notice a difference. Since using cloak stops your shield regeneration, I found it useful in those situations when your shield has dropped and you need to cloak for cover. Either of these opinions don't matter in making one better.

Operative (Assassin) is the better choice here imo. Better scope-in time dilation damage and duration, more weapon damage and power damage.

Okay no offense, but if another 10% sniper slowdown and .25 second longer duration is something you need, then you have horrible aim. This is the breakdown of meaningful passive stats:

Assassination = 6% weapon damage, 15% power damage vs. Agent = 5% health, 6% reduced power cooldown, 15% power duration, 30% paragon/renegade bonus.

If you are aren't using your power cooldowns frequently then I can understand the argument, but I am using my Incinerate and Cloak so much that the reduced power cooldown/increased power duration will far exceed the benefit of the increased weapon/power damage. There is also fact that until you are capped on either paragon/renegade points, the 30% extra bonus is extremely valuable in how you want to progress your character.

I can understand the arguement tho, so I will say this choice depends on your playstyle.

I think AP vs Warp ammo is highly debatable. Personally I used AP ammo the entire length of the game until the suicide mission where I knew I was going to encounter collectors with barriers. I admit the first encounter on the disabled collector ship was pretty difficult but frankly, armored enemies are the toughest to take down as armor is often the hardest defense to strip. Shields and barriers are fairly easy as even a stock SMG can easily cut through.

Armor is by far the easiest defense type for an Infiltrator, I have no idea why you seem to think otherwise. Incinerate is 2.4 times stronger against armor, and pistol/Widow is 50% stronger against armored targets.

Eclipse mercenaries will consist of shield/biotic defenses, Blue Suns consist of shield defenses, Geth consist of shield defenses, Collectors consist of barrier defenses, Husk/animals/Blood Pack is the only group of enemies that mainly consist of armor defenses. Also, just about every elite type of enemy will have multiple defense types, usually consisting of a shield/barrier followed by armor.

When enemies are in the mid/close range, SMG + Disruptor vs. shields, SMG + Warp vs. barriers. At long range you will want to use the ammo power best fitted for that armor type, barriers are the one type of defense you lack in terms of ammo powers, Warp Ammo removes that problem.

Modifié par senojones, 14 février 2010 - 07:19 .

[DannyGloverfromPredator2_]

senojones wrote...

Special weapon selection
Required: When you reach the mission to search a Collector ship, you will be givin three options of weapon selection, shotgun/assault rifle training or the Widow sniper. There should be no question in your choice, Widow is without a doubt the most powerful weapon an Infiltrator can use, capable of killing insanity level enemies with one headshot. Most people might be concerned about the ammo capacity, but the Widow is the highest single shot damage of any standard weapon and most heavy weapons (some could even consider the Widow as a heavy weapon). At the insanity level there will be a very high ammount of enemies with armor, this type of defense is the Widows largest strength, capable of taking large chunks away from even the toughest enemies.

Widow Anti-Material Rifle: Ammo Capacity = 1/12 (default), 1/13 (Off-hand Ammo Pack) - extremely effective against armor.

I have cleared Insanity twice with Infiltrators.  The first time I went with the expected heavy hitting Widow approach.  The second, I took a different approach.  Having done both, I maintain that the Widow is not necessarily the best way to go about things with an Infiltrator, and in fact is not necessarily the most effective in several situations.  When Widow-ing, you have to deal with limited ammunition and are taking on a role as the major damage dealer of your team.  The Widow-er will make use of cover, pop his head out cloaked for one massive head kill-shot and go back to cover.  I offer a different approach, that being a more team based approach using the Viper, and having at least on other Viper Sniper ally with you.

The Widow has without a doubt the most pure stopping power, but the Viper offers you several advantages:
1) MORE AMMO
2) Ability to use your sniping skills much more frequently and liberally
3) More room for error
4) Ability to soften/kill several foes on one clip/one time popping out of cover (especially true with cloak/time slowing Infiltrator skills)

For my different approach, I use a squad of either three Viper Snipers (Shepard/Garrus/Thane) or two Viper Snipers and Miranda (Shepard/Miranda/Garrus or Thane).  The allies do a good job using the Vipers, good usage of Warp/Overload/Incinerate (from appropriate team members) can strip defenses quickly, and you can easily catch enemies in a deadly and persistent semi-automatic sniper crossfire with good battlefield positioning.  I cloak to position Shepard in a flanking position to make the most use of this.  

I rely on frequent usage of powers and assignment of targets to my A.I. teammates.  I use Squad Disruptor and Squad Warp Ammo myself to make ally sniper fire work appropriately, with Warp Ammo being on unless we're dealing with a bunch of shielded foes. 

So, what I present is a more deliberate team of snipers approach where Shepard is constantly using the semi-auto Viper to soften/finish off enemies as opposed to delivering one shot kills with the Widow.  This approach rarely ever finds you for want of a few more sniper rounds.  I encourage others to give it a whirl and see if they enjoy it.  Anyone else playing similarly, feel free to chime in.

[Atmosfear3]

This is so situational, and is barely worth the power cooldown. You also can't turn heavy mechs until you break through their defense, which makes it even less useful. Granted this leftover talent point is worth putting into AI hacking over Cryo Ammo, but you still should rarely ever want to use this over other options.

What other options? You max cloak, disruptor, passive, incinerate, bonus. All thats left is AI and Cryo.

Uh what? Granted you are spending a lot of time in cover but that's still no excuse, you should gain the most benefit out of either of your teammates. If you are capable of decent aim, then you should have no problem exposing yourself for a couple of seconds when you see an opening between enemy fire. Not to mention any type of long range situation against Geth, you should be dropping targets constantly with your Widow + Disruptor Ammo. This is a personal preference argument, so if you are willing to lose 20% weapon damage for the sake of your team then that's your choice.

What does decent aim have to do with exposing yourself to enemy fire? Theres 1 case where you fight geth at long ranges and thats on that foggy planet. No, my reason for picking squad over heavy is for all those mercs you encounter, which compose what, like 70% of all enemies you fight in ME2? I would never use disruptor ammo on my widow. Are you telling me you're using your SR w/ disruptor rounds to take down mercs too?

Armor is by far the easiest defense type for an Infiltrator, I have no idea why you seem to think otherwise. Incinerate is 2.4 times stronger against armor, and pistol/Widow is 50% stronger against armored targets.

Eclipse mercenaries will consist of shield/biotic defenses, Blue Suns consist of shield defenses, Geth consist of shield defenses, Collectors consist of barrier defenses, Husk/animals/Blood Pack is the only group of enemies that mainly consist of armor defenses. Also, just about every elite type of enemy will have multiple defense types, usually consisting of a shield/barrier followed by armor.

When enemies are in the mid/close range, SMG + Disruptor vs. shields, SMG + Warp vs. barriers. At long range you will want to use the ammo power best fitted for that armor type, barriers are the one type of defense you lack in terms of ammo powers, Warp Ammo removes that problem.

The only targets with armor, excluding vorcha and varren are all fairly tough enemies, typically either Krogan or lieutenants and bosses. One incinerate + a headshot is not likely to bring down their armor that easily. Besides, you are ignoring the fact that its 70% more damage against health as well. I will agree that Warp ammo is most useful during the suicide mission. For all else, Armor Piercing was simply leaps and bounds better against everything else. Besides, you've got squadmates for stripping barriers.

[Besetment]

I've just started a NG+ Insanity as an Infiltrator and I'm on Freedom's Progress. Lvl 3 AP rounds do more damage to mechs than Heavy Disruptor rounds. Either way its 2 headshot kills per Loki/Fenris mech with the first shot stripping all armour. I'm going to switch to Squad Disruptor since I figure the chance to apply 3x overload/overheat just works better for me and its the one thing that separates Disruptor from AP at this point in the game.

Heres the thing though. If you plan for NG+ Insanity then choices like whether or not to go Assassin over Agent is really trivial. Whats more important is what powers your squadmates are packing. I found Jacob + Pull absolutely essential because many fights I would simply run out of sniper rounds before everything dies. Pull saves you from having to land the second shot, can be used whilst you reload and scope and stops a single target from wailing on you. Later on I'll try to find something with more utility but the point stands that you are far better off thinking about what squadmates to bring on each mission and what powers they should use than arguing over 6% less cooldown duration for Tactical Cloak.

The hardest parts of NG+ is the early game when you have no upgrades and all opponents are fully upgraded. You can try to do it without using squadmate powers but you'll just die alot and get overwhelmed. As it turns out, ME2 on NG+ Insanity is just like ME1 in the sense that you do cooldown juggling. Only this time you aren't juggling Marksman, Overload and Dampening on 1x character. You are Juggling Tactical Cloak, Overload and Pull over 3x characters.

I'll upload a video in a second to demonstrate this point. In the early game, +/- 15% weapon damage doesn't matter. Neither does +/- 6% cooldown. What Biotics/Tech/Squad Powers you have on your teammates matters alot more.

Modifié par Besetment, 14 février 2010 - 09:00 .

[Sarah Aran]

I'd like to chime in here and echo that the Widow, as awesome as it is, is not the be all end all for any infiltrator, with the Viper being very versatile, and the added option of a vindicator rifle for medium range engagements where armor is still a concern (certain scions and husk encounters come to mind here). Squad ammo is just plain good, period, although bring Jack along for Squad Warp ammo might be worth looking into, as she also offers a lot of crowd control.



As a note to the original poster while you've made it clear in subsequent posts that these are your own personal opinions, the whole tone of your guide makes those opinions sound more like the holy scripture of the Infiltrator class, not subject to question. You might want to tone down the language in it if you're hoping to avoid a lot of the same debates.

[Besetment]

Its generally a good guide though and its a good attempt at putting all the relevant information in one place so I commend that. Personally I wouldn't use anything other than the bolt action rifles (Mantis and Widow) or possibly the Incisor if you have the Digital Deluxe Edition. I never got a good pace down with the Incisor so I always ran out of ammo.

I don't get why you would use assault rifles on an Infiltrator though. Infiltrator is still inferior compared to a Soldier when it comes to damage output. More so when its sustained damage like you get from rapid fire weapons because a Soldier get +100% to +140% (50% time dilation) on every shot for the duration of Adrenaline Rush. Tactical Cloak ends as soon as you fire and imparts a 75% damage bonus (50% to 60% time dilation when scoping).

The concept behind Widow Infiltrators is that they try to maximise the damage they can deal under Tactical Cloak which sadly is still inferor to a Widow Soldier under Hardened or Heightened Adrenaline Rush but thats another topic of discussion.

Some of the big problems with Infiltrator right now is that Tactical Cloak ends when you shoot with no round in the chamber (causing you to reload). Reloading also causes Tactical Cloak to end. This may be a deliberate design decision but its definitely something to watch out for because you can waste alot of cloaks by forgetting to check theres a round in the chamber. The last 2 shots fired in this video:



show where I stuff this up. I also wasted another cloak earlier in the vid by cloaking and then reloading, when I needed to do it the other way around.

Be sure to check your reload when moving between cover since that can cancel the reload if the animation doesn't get far enough along. Its about half the animation and you can test this by shooting, reloading and punching to find the cutoff point. You can speed up the reload animation by punching just after the cutoff point but its only useful for Vanguards and the like who don't shoot from behind cover (you can't punch when you are behind cover).

Infiltrators need to aim roughly for the head of a target whilst they are reloading (the white reticle that appears when you reload helps you do this. See video). This reduces how much you have to move the mouse when you scope which reduces the amount of time between shots.

The other big problem with Infiltrators is with the way Tactical Cloak is implemented. I suspect it would make Infiltrator a great speedrunning class because you can shorten certain fights by stealthing past them. But if you want to shoot stuff, Soldier is pretty much always better.

Modifié par Besetment, 14 février 2010 - 06:10 .

[Pooh-bah]

I agree with those saying that the Viper is an excellent choice. I was forever running out of ammo with the Widow when I went that way, even with 1-shot-headshot-kills. The Widow is good but as other posters have mentioned, for thirteen clips you get thirteen shots. You don't find clips nearly oftern enough (eg. one clip per enemy killed) to keep you in ammo for the Widow, then you're stuck falling back on your pistol/smg, and powers.

I went with the assault rifle training so I could use the Geth Pulse Rifle which makes a joke of shields and barriers. It's really very good, and means that I can stop using my SMG with it's horrible accuracy and recoil; areas in which the Geth rifle are very strong are those in which the infiltrator is weak - it's an accurate and dangerous second weapon, it carries a hell of a lot of ammo, and it's incredibly good against barriers and shields. All the sniper rifles already destroy armour, so that's not a problem.

I'd also question bringing Disruptor Ammo, and Warp Ammo. Why use both? Elsewhere you comment on wasting cooldowns, and Heavy Disruptor is only useful against shields really. If you want to bring Warp Ammo as your bonus power then Disruptor seems redundant anyway, especially because you recommend Miranda (I'd agree that she is probably the best squad mate that you can take into any situation, because of her combination of powers - warp+overload - and because of her passive boost to squad damage) who can shred shields with Overload. With Area Overload used well, even on insanity it can take the shields of 2-4 enemies down to 40% ish.

Personally I would bring Disruptor Ammo (but I would add as an aside that I haven't had a chance to play with Cryo Ammo, it sounds really good in theory, but I haven't had a play through using it, so maybe it would be a viable and cool option to go with) and always use it, never bothering to use a cooldown switching ammo powers. The conclusion would be to not bring Warp Ammo. Powers of which I am a great fan of, especially in Insanity are ->

-Reave : does damage to anything, through anything. Double against Armour and Biotic Barriers. Gets redded out against shields but will do a reasonable chunk of damage to them too. If used on an enemy with only health left it drains their health to heal you. Area Reave is very very good and any time it hits more than one enemy it will be doing more damage overall than Heavy Reave, though Heavy is an incredibly high damage single target power and a good option.

-Dominate : yes it only works against enemies down to health, but most of them get that way eventually, and hitting an enemy tactically with dominate can shift the tide of battle. I'm a fan of area dominate because often enemies will hide behind cover when they only have health left, so you can find situations where there is one enemy behind some cover with only health and another one behind the same cover shooting at you, as soon as his shield goes down you can dominate them both by targeting the standing up one and use them to kill their friends. The Enhanced Dominate is really super fun too though, turning your one minion into a super soldier already in position to flank the enemy. Both forms of dominate are incredibly tactically useful that situations where they are crazy good come up all the time. It's one of my favourite skills in the game.

-Improved Geth Shield Boost : I only list the improved version rather than the other version because I feel the improved is so much superior. The other one gives you more shields but this one gives you a tasty 10% damage boost while it's active. The ability to use this power any time to instantly bring a shield up too is great for survivability in Insanity too.

-Warp/Armour Piercing Ammo : They are both great and it's very obvious what they do / how they work.

On the Assassin vs Agent front I'm with those who support Assassin. It isn't hard to get your paragon/renegade up to the highest levels with 'only' a 70% boost and 6% damage + 6% power damage is very good, the extra sniper slowdown + slowdown duration is just icing on the cake.

Please try and moderate your tone towards a more neutral and friendly rather than confrontational one. I appreciate that you've put time and effort into your guide but there certainly are options and those options are viable even if you didn't chose them. People mentioning other options are not attacking your guide, you don't need to be defensive about it, though that said in any game or situation I always prefer someone who lays out my options and allowes me as an intelligent audience to make my own decisions rather than trying to tell me what to do and not to think.

[Besetment]

Man Geth Shield Boost is not a good bonus power for an Infiltrator. It has a 12 second Cooldown! Not to mention that on NG+ Insanity you lose all your shields in 1 or 2 hits anyway so cover is more critical than a one time doubling of shields every 60 seconds. In the video I posted above I lost all shields and half health in about 1 second flat in the first 10 seconds of the video. Watch how quickly the shields get depleted and thats just for 2x Loki mechs.

Biotic powers like Reave and Dominate work best on squadmates where they can be used whilst you are reloading, cloaking and aiming. Even Incinerate is something that warrents limited use because it reduces the frequency with which you can cloak. You need to cloak/headshot round the clock to get your damage output anywhere close to a Soldier and if you don't do that then you might as well just play a soldier.

Modifié par Besetment, 14 février 2010 - 11:46 .

[Paeyvn]

Besetment wrote...

Man Geth Shield Boost is not a good bonus power for an Infiltrator. It has a 12 second Cooldown! Not to mention that on NG+ Insanity you lose all your shields in 1 or 2 hits anyway so cover is more critical than a one time doubling of shields every 60 seconds. In the video I posted above I lost all shields and half health in about 1 second flat in the first 10 seconds of the video. Watch how quickly the shields get depleted and thats just for 2x Loki mechs.

Biotic powers like Reave and Dominate work best on squadmates where they can be used whilst you are reloading, cloaking and aiming. Even Incinerate is something that warrents limited use because it reduces the frequency with which you can cloak. You need to cloak/headshot round the clock to get your damage output anywhere close to a Soldier.

I disagree personally on the Geth Shield, there are playstyles that make it quite effective...though they're different. I'd go into it more but it's 4am and I'm exhausted. If done properly though, you can avoid it going down for the full minute, which lets you shoot more often than just cloak shots. And if you want you can still cloak/hs...cloak only cancels the graphic for the shield, not the actual effect.

[Awesome Helmet]

i dont know why youd want geth sheild boost when you have cloak. cloak is probably the best defensive ability in game. for 6 seconds, no enemy can see you. i think its better then tech armor, which is the best D boosting ability in game. not to mention cloaks bonus to offense too. taking another defensive ability seems redundant.



same thing for taking AP ammo. disruptor might not be the best ammo mod, but its effective. i have incinerate to take care of armors, so i use that instead of an ammo mod. i think theres better options out there to pick up for an infiltrator then an ammo mod. i take slam as a bonus ability. crippling slam takes an opponent out for no shorter then 8 seconds. which is a very nice CC ability. ill never play the sentinel again. its pointless. taking slam with any non biotic makes you a better "sentinel" then the actual sentinel class. you only need one ability to spam, and slam can easily replace throw to do that.



the thing with infiltrators is that they are meant to be sniping classes. one shot, one kill specialists. you cant do that with the viper nor the vindicator. i never really had an ammo problem with the widow either. i use it as a main weapon and very rarely do i end up walking around with less then 4 bullets. you can really be any class you want in this game since bonus abilities can cover what you dont have, or what you do need. but if you dont take the widow maker as an infiltrator, your playing the wrong class.

[Pooh-bah]

Besetment wrote...

Man Geth Shield Boost is not a good bonus power for an Infiltrator. It has a 12 second Cooldown! Not to mention that on NG+ Insanity you lose all your shields in 1 or 2 hits anyway so cover is more critical than a one time doubling of shields every 60 seconds. In the video I posted above I lost all shields and half health in about 1 second flat in the first 10 seconds of the video. Watch how quickly the shields get depleted and thats just for 2x Loki mechs.

Biotic powers like Reave and Dominate work best on squadmates where they can be used whilst you are reloading, cloaking and aiming. Even Incinerate is something that warrents limited use because it reduces the frequency with which you can cloak. You need to cloak/headshot round the clock to get your damage output anywhere close to a Soldier and if you don't do that then you might as well just play a soldier.

It depends how you play. I agree that Geth Shield Boost isn't as good as cloak in many situations. I listed the shield boost last in order of active powers because it's the last of the three that I like that I'd consider even remotely useful for Infiltrator.  I agree that the cloak is the best "Oh crap!" button in the game, but other situations, especfially when bunkering down behind cover and getting into a protracted fire fight with enemies make the Geth Shield Boost shine.

It probably benifits from my more hybrid soldier-esq playstyle that uses the Viper and the Geth Pulse Rifle which turns me more into a commando than a dedicated sniper

Damage output also isn't everything. I have a lot of fun with my Soldier, and I have a lot of fun with my Infiltrator, and with my Adept too. I have totally different playstyles with each. I dont know whether my soldier actually gets through the game faster than my Infiltrator though, if you quantify damage output as "DPS over a reasonable period of time in order to produce an acceptable statistical average" then you're probably right that the soldier has a better damage output. But...  on insanity I don't tend to be shooting at targets for large periods of time, even with hardened adrenaline rush, enemies duck behind cover and regen their shields/barriers and all that. With my infiltrator if I plan ahead I have an apropriate sniper rifle with me and can go for the cloak+1-shot headshot-kill in situations where that will get me through quickly and where my soldier would have to bunker down and get into a protracted firefight. To put it into MMO jargon my soldier has better dps, but my infiltrator has better burst.

And my adept is a caster.

Maybe it's "better" for me not to be messing around with crazy biotic powers, but well, I have a lot of fun using them. I think there have been several situations my Insanity Soldier would never have made it through without her Dominate ability. I'm not leaning so hard on Reave on my Insanity Infiltrator, but it's really rewarding and fun to have a button I can press to punish enemies for standing next to eachother; Incinerate works too of course, but Reave can be used to set off another area-effect from Warp, and additionally makes enemies stand still and convulse in agony while I'm sucking the life out of them so they're easy to shoot. Ammo powers might be better, but they bore me and the point of the game for me is fun not achieving maximum speed/efficiency.

Milage always varies

[PhlaagoRexor]

awesome helmet... slam?? on insanity difficulty?

If there is more than a handful of enemies without armor and/or shields/barrier its some poor sod in a non essential mission somewhere.



Anyway, I turned my maxed out me1 vanguard into a infiltrator when i started my me2 playthrough.



As she turned out I ended up using.



disruptor ammo (squad) 4 (had heavy disruptor but respecced to squad because I was spending alot of time in cover and having the odd mech blow up didnt seem all that useful)



cryo ammo 1 (activate it on the heavy pistol to have it ready with a simple weaponswitch later without messing with your cooldowns, if you want to use it at all that is... unless im mistaken its useless until defenses are breached)



tactical cloak (assasination) 4

incinerate (heavy) 4 (I would recommend choosing incineration blast instead, it would save you alot of trouble against swarms of husks... most notably in one of the non essential missions when I ended up using the M-100 grenade launcher to clear them out)



Operative (Assasin) 4

AP ammo (Tungsten) 4



For the suicide mission I went with legion+samara as squadmates for the combat drone + samaras reave..



As a side note, I believe I had 4 upgrades for sniper damage when I took out the thresher maw in about 1m55s, I only had ammo for 1 shot with the cain and it didnt even drop the maw to 50% (can we please get cloak changed so it stays on until the weapon actually fires??? )



I leave you with some thoughts from professor Solus.

damage bonus from tactical cloak does not seem to be multiplicative in regards to stacking, additive seems more likely. Damage bonus noticable but likely not full 70%. Wonder, stacking additive with ammo damage?

[Besetment]

Awesome Helmet wrote...

i dont know why youd want geth sheild boost when you have cloak. cloak is probably the best defensive ability in game. for 6 seconds, no enemy can see you. i think its better then tech armor, which is the best D boosting ability in game. not to mention cloaks bonus to offense too. taking another defensive ability seems redundant.

Agreed.

same thing for taking AP ammo. disruptor might not be the best ammo mod, but its effective. i have incinerate to take care of armors, so i use that instead of an ammo mod. i think theres better options out there to pick up for an infiltrator then an ammo mod.

Disagree. Heavy Incinerate isn't as effective on NG+ Insanity. On Veteran mode or lower its a 1 hit kill versus husks and it shaves armour to the bone so yeah its very useful if you don't play Hardcore/Insanity/NG+. Its still useful on the higher difficulty settings but becomes much more situational because the more you have to use it, the less cloak time you get. The advantage of AP ammo is that its passive so you gain the benefits while cloaked.

i take slam as a bonus ability. crippling slam takes an opponent out for no shorter then 8 seconds. which is a very nice CC ability. ill never play the sentinel again. its pointless. taking slam with any non biotic makes you a better "sentinel" then the actual sentinel class. you only need one ability to spam, and slam can easily replace throw to do that.

I wouldn't take any Biotic or Tech bonus powers because they delay the use of cloak. Honestly, your teammates are there for a reason so take advantage of their tech/biotics in conjunction with what you do well which is instantaneous armour and shield removal.

You should have hotkeys set up to activate squadmate powers like Overload, Slam and Reave anyway. I reconfigure them at the start of every mission that requires different skill sets and squadmates. You can activate these hotkeys whilst moving to cover, reloading, aiming etc. Furthermore, you can also use those hotkeys to quickly focus fire on a baddie you need to get rid of quickly. Sometimes you get these melee types that get in your face and you haven't removed all their protections yet.

You can quickly press 3, 2, <shoot> and then 1 where
3 = Tactical Cloak
2 = Overload
1 = Pull

or something like that. The effectiveness of your combos depends upon what upgrades you have picked up and what squadmates you take with you. Its also worth experimenting with activating differerent powers in different orders to stagger the cooldowns.

Modifié par Besetment, 14 février 2010 - 01:58 .

[Awesome Helmet]

i have an infiltrator on veteran at level 30 and incinerate does really well for me. im about 3 hours from trying him out on insanity so well see how incinerate works on the higher difficulties. i dont see why youd need to "waste" the bonus talent on an ammo mod when you can just use disruptor ammo. but that manly goes along with my play style.



i dont rely heavily on my squadmates and i dont consider building my shepard with them in mind. i like my characters to be well rounded. they all have a debuff like warp/incinerate, an ammo mod like warp ammo/disruptor ammo, a CC ability like throw/slam and a defensive ability like tech armor/cloak and they all take the sniper rifle on the collectors ship. they are all capable of doing anything with the bonus of specializing in sniping, or choice in biotic abilities. that might be why i lean towards disruptor ammo, becasue i use slam and i need shields gone to do that.



the thing is with global cooldowns, you only need one ability to accomplish each one of those things. so i dont need more then one ammo mod and i dont think i need more then one biotic ability.

[Besetment]

If you try to do everything on one character then you have to use your powers sequentially instead of coextensively. That means you do everything slow.

[senojones]

What other options? You max cloak, disruptor, passive, incinerate, bonus. All thats left is AI and Cryo.

You're misreading this, I meant in choosing the max ranks. As in you should never be picking 4/4 AI Hacking over Cloak/Disruptor/Incinerate.

What does decent aim have to do with exposing yourself to enemy fire?

Better aim = less time exposing yourself.

No, my reason for picking squad over heavy is for all those mercs you encounter, which compose what, like 70% of all enemies you fight in ME2? I would never use disruptor ammo on my widow.

Wait, you don't use Disruptor Ammo against enemies with shields? That is a perfect example of ignorance to game mechanics. I always start out with Disruptor Ammo against shielded enemies, if there is a situation when their shield is removed, I can simply swap to Warp Ammo.

The only targets with armor, excluding vorcha and varren are all fairly tough enemies, typically either Krogan or lieutenants and bosses. One incinerate + a headshot is not likely to bring down their armor that easily. Besides, you are ignoring the fact that its 70% more damage against health as well. I will agree that Warp ammo is most useful during the suicide mission. For all else, Armor Piercing was simply leaps and bounds better against everything else

Its 20% more damage against health, Warp Ammo = 50% to health/armor/barriers - AP Ammo = 70% to health/armor. You should really research your facts before you start questioning me. Adding in Warp from teammates with Incinerate + headshot, yes I can strip away every non-elite enemy easily, including Krogan.

Please try and moderate your tone towards a more neutral and friendly rather than confrontational one. I appreciate that you've put time and effort into your guide but there certainly are options and those options are viable even if you didn't chose them.

Just because there are other options, doesn't mean they are the best options. I base my opinion on experience, with ME2 and other FPS shooter games, and I strive to get the best and most efficant overall result. You can either choose to trust my judgment and use this information to help yourself, or you can ignore it. I could play through the whole game naked with a shotgun and still make it viable, but I know its not the best option. I have very little patience for the majority of public forums, so I apologize for my tone.

Modifié par senojones, 14 février 2010 - 07:40 .

[beermilk]

Does anyone even know if the extra 20% damage to health and armor is really worth it instead of picking warp ammo?

[senojones]

beermilk wrote...

Does anyone even know if the extra 20% damage to health and armor is really worth it instead of picking warp ammo?

You'll have to base that answer on people opinions, including my own. If there is information on exact enemy health/armor/shield/barrier values (assuming your lvl 30), then I could tell you.

[Besetment]

beermilk wrote...

Does anyone even know if the extra 20% damage to health and armor is really worth it instead of picking warp ammo?

You mean from AP ammo? Theres really no reason not to pick AP ammo from the start (if you are playing NG+) because you won't be running into barriers for a while. The first few missions are the hardest anyway because you have no upgrades till you get Mordin and it even takes a while to get to a Weapons Locker so you are stuck using the Mantis. In these missions I've tested the difference between Warp, AP and Disruptor ammo and broadly speaking, AP ammo does the most damage but it effectively makes no difference which ammo type you use.  It always takes 2x Mantis headshots per mech for the kill. It doesn't matter if you are cloaked or uncloaked since the first headshot strips all armour regardless and that allows you to put Miranda + Overload and Jacob + Pull into play and Pull is GOD in NG+.

After Omega though your mileage varies highly because it depends entirely on what upgrades you get and in what order as well as what squadmates you pick and how you have assigned their powers. Either way you should keep checking how much damage you are doing to enemies as you advance through the game. If an extra 20% damage helps get the 1 shot kills then its worth it as it means you can save squad powers for other enemies.

Warp ammo is absolutely better choice for Collector heavy missions. You can always pick AP ammo at the start and respec to Warp ammo for Collector missions though. and theres certainly enough eezo in the game to allow you to do this. Also don't forget that anything that increases power damage (i.e. 15% from Assassin evolution) also increases the damage you do with ammo.

Modifié par Besetment, 14 février 2010 - 10:37 .

[WillieStyle]

senojones wrote...

What other options? You max cloak, disruptor, passive, incinerate, bonus. All thats left is AI and Cryo.

You're misreading this, I meant in choosing the max ranks. As in you should never be picking 4/4 AI Hacking over Cloak/Disruptor/Incinerate.

He meant that there's hardly any oppurtunity cost to getting that 1 rank in AI.  He was right. You're point here isn't relevant to his.

What does decent aim have to do with exposing yourself to enemy fire?

Better aim = less time exposing yourself.

Once you get to the point where you almost never miss (easy to do with Sniper slow- mo), damage recieved no longer has anything to do with aim.

No, my reason for picking squad over heavy is for all those mercs you encounter, which compose what, like 70% of all enemies you fight in ME2? I would never use disruptor ammo on my widow.

Wait, you don't use Disruptor Ammo against enemies with shields? That is a perfect example of ignorance to game mechanics. I always start out with Disruptor Ammo against shielded enemies, if there is a situation when their shield is removed, I can simply swap to Warp Ammo.

There's no reason to be obnoxious about this.  He isn't ignorant of game mechanics.  Fact is, your squadmate's abilities hit enemies instantly, never miss if you have line-of-sight, and are FAR more effective against shields/barriers than they are against armor/health.    It makes more sense to use Miranda/Garrus's overload on a semi-tough enemy and then use Tungsten rounds on your Widow to take him out.
Furthermore, he's right that having teammates with SMGs and Assault Rifles (weapons that are extra effective against shields) with squad disruptor to take down shields, is more efficient than putting disruptor on your Sniper rifle.  The only exception to this is Geth. But as he said, there are  a lot more Mercs than Geth in this game.

The only targets with armor, excluding vorcha and varren are all fairly tough enemies, typically either Krogan or lieutenants and bosses. One incinerate + a headshot is not likely to bring down their armor that easily. Besides, you are ignoring the fact that its 70% more damage against health as well. I will agree that Warp ammo is most useful during the suicide mission. For all else, Armor Piercing was simply leaps and bounds better against everything else

Its 20% more damage against health, Warp Ammo = 50% to health/armor/barriers - AP Ammo = 70% to health/armor. You should really research your facts before you start questioning me. Adding in Warp from teammates with Incinerate + headshot, yes I can strip away every non-elite enemy easily, including Krogan.

What's the point of this? Despite your rudeness, nothing you said here contradicted him.  You can strip away every non-elite enemy easily with warp from teammates + incenerate + headshot? Grats. He can to.  How is this an argument for taking warp ammo over Armor Piercing ammo?

Let's say you're facing an enemy with equal parts barrier, armor and health.  If your base weapon dps is X, then
with warp ammo you will do: (1.5X + 1.5X + 1.5X)/3 = 1.5X dps to the enemy.
with Tungsten ammo you will do: (1.0X + 1.7X + 1.7X)/3 = 1.47X dps to the enemy.
So warp ammo is slightly better if you just fire on the enemy with the same ammo type.
But wait, you use Warp and Incenerate.  Let's say Warp takes down 70% of the enemy's barrier and Incenerate takes out 70% of the enemies armor. Then
with warp ammo you will do: (0.3*1.5X + 0.3*1.5X + 1.5X)/1.6 = 1.5X dps to the enemy
with tungsten ammo you will do: (0.3*1.0X + 0.3*1.7X + 1.7X)/1.6 = 1.57 dps to the enemy.
Conclusion: using powers that are effective againste barrier/armor increases the efficacy of Tungsten Ammo relative to Warp ammo.  The more damage your squadmates' Warp/Reave in particular do to barriers, the more valuable Tungsten Ammo becomes. 
Given that so many squadmates have powers that are especially effective against shields/barriers, it makes sense to use them along with Tungsten Ammo, than to use Warp ammo.  The difference is small, but Tungsten > Warp. 

[Verilligo]

One could always try something absolutely crazy, too.



Disruptor Ammo 3

Squad Cryo Ammo 10

Tactical Cloak 6 (yes, I'm not maxing it)

Incineration Blast 10

AI Hacking 6

Agent 10

Dominate 6

Additional Weapon: Geth Pulse Rifle



Add Disruptor Ammo to the pulse rifle, switch to the Viper and use Squad Cryo. Go into battle, whittle an enemy to health, Dominate/AI Hack. Cloak to reset aggro to the controlled enemy, pop out of cover and start sniping, watch tons of things get nice and frosty. If you run into something with armor, use Incinerate and then snipe. Pulse rifle can be used for stripping an enemy down to health. Is it the most practical thing? Maybe not. Could be fun, though.

[Awesome Helmet]

the infiltrator isnt defined by its bonus talent. you can swap your bonus talent basically whenever you want so deciding on only one and saying "this is the only and best bonus talent an infiltrator can have" isnt what this topic should be about. theres not alot of variation in class builds. there all very stream lined in what their specialty is. the infiltrator is a sniping class regardless of what else it has to offer, you play an infiltrator to use cloak and snipe. so theres a few things the infiltrator needs...



widow maker. it should be self explanatory. the best sniper rifle in game for the best sniping class. garrus and thane only wish they could use it.



operative/assassin. if your a gamer that likes dialogue then go the other route. but if you play this game to blow things up and specifically play an infiltrator, nothings better then what the assassin class can do for you.



heavy incinerate. great debuff. depending if you take reave or another bonus talent as your debuff, heavy incinerate does great damage, along with a stun animation on its targets so theres a minor added CC bonus.



cloak/assasination. cloak is good for a one shot hit. so get the most bang for your buck. and it shouldnt take you 8 seconds to get that accomplished, which is the only benefit of going the other route.



heavy disruptor ammo. i dont take squad ammo because i want the greatest boost to damage i can get on my own character. i dont find squad ammo that interesting. usually i take heavys in all categories, but sometimes its good to take squad on your squadmates if your interested in everyone getting a little boost to damage. this ability can be subjective too. depending if you take AP ammo or like cryo rounds. i roll with disruptor because i feel like all ammo mods are worthy.



bonus talent. i take crippleing slam. i find it to be an incredibly useful one enemy disable. this option can be subjective, but adding a biotic to the infiltrator really rounds out what i can do with it.



1 point in AI hacking. you got 1 point left, where else you gonna put it?



not only does going with this set up allow me to be an incredibly deadly sniping class, its also good to have an ability for every situation. i find its almost like playing the sentinel. they have very similar setups.