Mass Effect 2 gameplay thread

**Hooahguy** · 07-25-2010, 16:06

I need some advice: I'm currently working towards going after the Reaper IFF (I'm playing on medium difficulty), then to the Omega 4 Relay, but I'm spending the time upgrading everything and doing all the side missions. I already fully upgraded my ship with the armor, guns, and multicore shielding (so I won't lose anyone en route to the base, fully upgraded my assault rifle as well as partially upgraded all the other weapons; I've recruited all my crew except Legion, obviously, and have all their loyalty except for Jack, whom I sacrificed her loyalty for Miranda’s— after all, Miranda is hotter and my paragon/renegade points weren't high enough to keep both of them.
I am currently 3/5 with paragon, 1/5 renegade.
My current plan is to keep mining until I get 10,000 element zero, so I can afford the advanced training twice- once for AP bullets before I undertake the Overlord missions (there are a lot of synthetic enemies, I'm assuming, since I will be dealing with enemy VI), then before I go to the Reaper ship, I plan on switching to Shredder bullets, which will tear apart the husks and other biotic enemies. Or am I making a mistake switching to shredder ammunition?
Now that I think about it, the Husks are easy to mow down with my light machine gun anyhow with incendiary ammo, but the Scions are harder to kill. And the Scions are armored, so I think I’ll keep the AP ammunition. Gee, I think I just saved myself a lot of time scanning for element zero!
But what I'm asking is, once I get Legion to join my team and earn his loyalty, do I keep Tali’s loyalty or Legion’s? My paragon level isn’t good enough to keep both of them, I don’t think (how high does it have to be anyways?) I heard that Legion is more useful than Tali, but I’m not sure.
Also, how does the final mission work? What determines whether a squad member dies or not? Loyalty? In that case, I’d lose two members since everyone else is loyal, but is there anything else that comes into play?

On a side note, does anyone else think that the side missions, as well as some of the loyalty missions, are painfully short? I mean for Tali, her mission took me all of 15 minutes, and one particular side mission only took a grand total of 7 minutes. I am definitely playing this again on hard!

One more thing: I've heard how after you beat the game and if you survived, you can start over with all your upgrades still there (but not paragon/renegade points). Is that true? I would love to start the game with the fully upgraded LMG, but this time I'm going to be a renegade.

**rajpoot** · 07-25-2010, 17:09

You can start over with a fully upgraded character. Including the skills you picked from companion loyalties.

AFAIK, who survives the final mission depends on loyalty mission but not solely on that. There are quite a few factors, including a character's toughness (which comes into play specifically....

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

Also say Jack isn't loyal and you choose her for a biotic job during the endgame, she is likely to falter, causing her and maybe one of your teammates to die. It's all quite complicated. Check here -
Link to Suicide missions details on the wiki.

**tibilicus** · 07-25-2010, 17:11

You need pretty high paragon or renegade to keep both legion and Tali's loyalty. It's personal preference I guess and you don't need complete loyalty from everyone to have everyone survive the suicide mission. Although, without spoiling too much, you should never ask non-loyal squad mates to do specific tasks which may require someone who is committed and trustworthy.

**Monk** · 07-26-2010, 00:46

Originally Posted by tibilicus

You need pretty high paragon or renegade to keep both legion and Tali's loyalty. It's personal preference I guess and you don't need complete loyalty from everyone to have everyone survive the suicide mission. Although, without spoiling too much, you should never ask non-loyal squad mates to do specific tasks which may require someone who is committed and trustworthy.

It's the highest renegade/paragon check in the game, the paragon check is a little lower than the renegade check so if you're playing through as renegade you may wanna save recruiting legion until the last possible chance.

If you can't secure both of their loyalties in the crisis moment then another option comes in supporting Tali and then talking to Legion afterward. Legion will be angry (well as angry as Geth can be) but you can lie to him and tell him you only supported Tali for the sake of the mission. Legion will understand and his loyalty will be restored.

**Hooahguy** · 07-26-2010, 02:30

Originally Posted by Monk

It's the highest renegade/paragon check in the game, the paragon check is a little lower than the renegade check so if you're playing through as renegade you may wanna save recruiting legion until the last possible chance.

If you can't secure both of their loyalties in the crisis moment then another option comes in supporting Tali and then talking to Legion afterward. Legion will be angry (well as angry as Geth can be) but you can lie to him and tell him you only supported Tali for the sake of the mission. Legion will understand and his loyalty will be restored.

But does that require a high paragon/renegade level? If so, Im going to side with Legion. Tali is useless and I enjoy seeing Legion do the Robot.