Category Archives: Drell Vanguard

Squishy Lightning – by CoreyImperia

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Build Title: Squish Lightning

Class: Drell Vanguard

Map Difficulty Rating: This build has the potential for Gold gameplay

Power Evolutions:
Biotic Charge: (4) Radius, (5) Weapon Synergy, (6) Barrier
Pull: N/A
Cluster Grenade: (4) Force & Damage, (5) Max Grenades, (6) Shrapnel
Drell Assassin: (4) Damage & Capacity, (5) Power Damage, (6) Weapon Damage
Fitness: (4) Durability, (5) Shield Recharge, (6) Fitness Expert

 

Weapons:
This build is built around the use of the Reegar Carbine, a heavy-hitter, close-quarters weapon which is perfect for Vanguard classes. If you aren’t using the Reegar Carbine, opt for the M-23 Hornet, N7 Hurricane, M-12 Locust, M-358 Talon or Cerberus Harrier but get Power Synergy at Rank 5 Biotic Charge instead. Put Shredder and High Caliber Barrel on the Reegar Carbine. If using the Hornet or Hurricane, SMG Recoil Systems and High Velocity Barrel. If using the Locust use High Velocity Barrel and Heat Sink. For the Talon, High Caliber Barrel (Pistol Heavy Barrel if Talon high leveled) and Piercing Mod. And if using the Harrier, Extended Magazine and Extended Barrel. My recommendation however, is the Reegar and I would only recommended the other five options over it if you did not have the Reegar Carbine.

 

Gear:
The Reegar Carbine should always have Incendiary Ammo. This reduces its armor-damage penalty and makes it more versatile. Biotic Charge and Cluster Grenade can also detonate Fire Explosions this way. Use a Shotgun Rail Amp for weapons bonus and Adrenaline Module, Power Amplifier Module or Power Efficiency Module for your armor bonus as Cyclonic Modulator is useless on a Drell (only a bonus 250 barriers with Cyclonic III and 375 with Cyclonic IV – totally not worth it). Shock Trooper Upgrade will be your way to go with the Reegar. An additional +12% Shotgun Damage on top of the +30% from the Rail Amp and 2 additional Grenades at Shock Trooper Upgrade V.

 

Strategy:
Drell happened to be one of the coolest races in the Mass Effect universe… unfortunately for them, being cool doesn’t mean they’re well off in the ME3 Multiplayer. Drell are one of the hardest classes to play; the others being the Volus and Geth with Hunter Mode. Unfortunately again, he doesn’t get Shield Boost, Biotic Orbs, Recon Mine, Stasis, Proximity Mine or Hunter Mode to help him. No, he got Pull… poor Drell. They do, however, boast the highest Power Damage passive which is nice. I’ll go over the power evolutions, how this build fares against the enemies and then what the Drell will have trouble with.
Biotic Charge is tailored to builds that use the Reegar Carbine. Radius allows Charge to hit multiple targets, Weapon Damage supercharges the Reegar Carbine with 25% damage for 5 seconds and Barrier gives the Drell back what it needs and acts as gap-closer. Pull is ignored, you’ve no need for it as the Reegar can shoot Guardians through their shields. Cluster Grenades are best evolved this way because they’re powerful and you’ll have enough in reserve. You don’t need Radius because you will have a cluster of 3 grenades. If you often play with randoms, get Max Grenades. If you play as part of biotic teams with this class get damage combo. The reason you get Damage Combo is because the way the power is worded makes it seem useless; but it actually increases the damage Cluster Grenades do to targets primed with biotics! That’s +100% Cluster Grenade Damage to a target that has been hit with powers like Dark Channel, Reave, Warp, Smash or anything that primes targets. It’s better to get Shrapnel over Force & Damage because you get more out of throwing three instead of two. You can detonate 3 separate explosions this way. It’s like with Multi-Frag Grenades, better to shoot 5 than 3 slightly stronger ones. As stated above, Drell character have the highest passive Power Damage bonuses of all classes but the N7 Demolisher (who can have +65%). With this evolution, the Drell Vanguard gets +50% Power Damage and +22.50% Weapon Damage. Standard Fitness applies; with this you have 900 Health and 450 Barriers and +20% Movement Speed.
The Drell Vanguard, like most other Vanguards, finds its niche with the trooper-tier enemies (anything that isn’t a Scion, Atlas, Praetorian, Banshee, Brute, Ravager or Geth Prime) and because of this can clear them out very effectively. Charge to get to them, Reegar them for 5 seconds and then get out. You can use the Drell’s dodge manoeuvre to help with this, Acrobatics do help. His Biotic Charge is strong enough to stagger all trooper enemies and even some boss enemies when they’re caught off-guard. Cluster Grenades are you ticket to clusters of enemies, they can clear out mass amounts of enemies and come with an unprecedented 2000 N Force! That will stagger everything it hits, if it hits bosses directly. However, Cluster Grenades are probably the hardest grenade to aim and their bouncing properties make it unforgiving to miss, especially when you really need it to hit. Practice makes perfect I suppose.
For the ‘weaker’ big enemies (Scions, Brutes, Ravagers), Cluster Grenade them, Biotic Charge and Reegar and then get the hell out of there. If the target has just done its Melee or just been staggered I don’t recommend charging in as this is when Brutes and Scions are must likely to sync-kill you. For bosses I only recommend Charging Altases, Primes and Banshees for the stagger and I do not recommend charging Praetorians (very bad idea). Atlas and Geth Prime shields won’t last long with the Reegar Carbine and Cluster Grenades will help keep them staggered, allow you and your team to tear away at their Armor. If you are using my recommendation for the Ammo Power, the Reegar should also be able to deal decent damage to the Armor over time. Standard rules apply for Banshees, but I suggest enticing them to follow you. You’ll be able to get rid of their Barrier with the Reegar and then feel free to Charge them for staggers, its a little harder to hit them with Cluster Grenades but they’re just as effective. You’ll need help from your team for Praetorians; use your Cluster Grenades and aim well and pray it doesn’t pull up that Spherical Barrier.
The Drell Vanguard has two major flaws. It’s piss-poor defences leave a lot to be desired as a Vanguard when you have so many other options. Unless you have no other Vanguard, their isn’t really the need to use him. Which is saddening because I like the Drell. With that 50% Power Damage who wouldn’t? He is now more viable to use but is still squishy. He can’t do objectives by himself and he can’t tank out objective waves like the Krogan Battlemaster can. He also lacks Reave from his Adept counterpart which weakens him further. His defences are somewhat mitigated by his stellar movement speed and acrobatics, but only somewhat. They help but won’t save you everytime. And again his Adept counterpart will beat him out because they have the same Fitness bonuses, but the Adept gets Reave.

 

N00b Rating:
4.5 – The Drell Vanguard has never been an easy character to play. In fact, the Drell characters have the second lowest defences even with their Fitness buffs a while back. They’ve got the fastest speed of all classes however, but this still fails to secure their survival. You have to be careful which is difficult for an aggressive vanguard, but making smart, aggressive decisions is what will work with this class. At first you may (and probably will) find this difficult if you don’t play as a Drell often but you will learn how to play a Drell… Quickly or die lots trying. Either way works but I’m sure you’d all prefer the former.
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Biotic Ninja – by Collin

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Build Title:

Biotic Ninja

Power Evoultions:

Charge:  Radius (4)
Pull:  Radius (4), Expose (5), Duration and Combo (6)
Cluster Grenade:  Radius (4), Max Grenades (5), Force & Damage (6)
Drell Assassin:  Damage & Capacity (4), Power Damage (5), Pistols (6)
Fitness: (1), (2), (3)

Weapons:

I’m of two minds here.  If you use my above build, I would say go with the Carnifex.  The capacity and pistols modifiers should keep you light.  If you want to play more conservatively (my preference) I would change out the final evolution from Pistols to Weapon Damage and rock an SMG.

Strategy:

There are actually two strategies with this build.  The primary function is to serve and a mobile, close range biotic assassin.  You would set up your initial attack preferably from a flank and fire off a Pull, followed up by Charge to trigger the biotic explosion.  The pull evolutions should enable you to decimate a tightly clumped group of enemies within one attack.  If there are still enemies standing, end them with a point blank cluster grenade.  Speaking of grenades, use these liberally.  You have more movement speed than any other race and you should exploit this.  Use grenades as long range novas and use them on protected enemies.  A charge + grenade can do some serious damage to a Banshee or Phantom.

The other strategy is a bit more conservative.  As I alluded to in my weapons brief, if you want to play more conservatively, instead of pistols for Drell Assassin, take damage and use an SMG.  Just as in previous games, SMGs are high rate of fire guns that are ideal for stripping shields and barriers if you lack an overload-like ability.  Once you’ve dropped their shields/barriers, follow through with your Pull > Charge > Grenade combo.  For this, I’d run with a Locust.


N00b Rating: (scale 1-5, 1 is easy for everybody!)

5, no question.  This is a close range vanguard for optimum damage.  You have the grenades for a mid to close range nova but let’s be frank, Drell are squishy.  Learn to dodge, ESPECIALLY backwards.  Once you’ve fired off your combo DO NOT CHARGE AGAIN, backflip out of there and duck into cover.  You MUST capitalize on hit and run tactics, you can’t ‘tank’ like a human vanguard or asari.


-edits by Lucien Midnight


Color Scheme:

Be a stylish ninja, I like this color scheme:

PrimaryColor – A 16

HighlightColor – B 9

By using black (A 16) as the primary color, any highlight colors will show up much darker.  This will net you a nice dark red, perfect for the blood you will spill (hopefully more of your enemy’s!)

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Cash Money – by Lucien Midnight

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Build Title:

Cash Money – by Lucien Midnight

Power Evolutions:

Biotic Charge: Radius (4), Power Synergy (5), Barrier (6)
Pull: Radius (4), Expose (5), Duration & Combo (6)
Cluster Grenade: N/A
Drell Assassin: Damage & Capacity (4), Power Damage(5), Pistols (6)
Fitness: Durability (4), Shield Recharge (5), Fitness Expert (6)

Weapons:

Use your favorite pistol. I like the Carnifex which is why i’ve selected Pistols (6) for the final rank in Drell Assassin. If you use a lighter pistol you could most likely afford to drop that evolution and spend the point on the first three ranks of Cluster Grenade for some backup damage in case you get stuck with your shields down. This class can also be spec’d to use a shotgun such as the Katana but perhaps i’ll add that build later. ;)

Strategy:

First you need to find group of enemies that are within 2 meters of each other. This happens most frequently when enemies first begin to spawn at the beginning of each wave, at certain choke points created by the map or your teammates, and in small rooms where hack objectives are located. When you see such a scenario it’s time for you to make that money…

I’ve spec’d pull and biotic charge to affect multiple enemies. The combination of these powers causes a biotic explosion, so hit multiple enemies with pull, then those same enemies with your biotic charge and viola! You’ve bio-blasted the crap out of them. This is very difficult to achieve, so make sure you aim and time your powers carefully. Don’t charge in, for example, on a good looking group of troopers if they are in front of two engineers, a turret, and an Atlas. You will certainly perish.

The Carnifex is excellent for headshots, but more importantly, it will help you remove shields from enemies. If you have a ton of ammo power upgrades, I’d definitely recommend disruptor ammo. Shoot at the head, take down those shields, pull, charge, BOOM. You will seriously mess up some enemies if you do it right.

N00B Rating: (scale 1-5, 1 is easy for everybody)

5. I’ve maxed out fitness to give the Drell a slightly better chance but his shields are only at 450 even with the upgrades. This class can do massive damage but you’ll probably end up bleeding out on the floor as a hot mess of guts quite often. Please post here and let me know if it’s even possible to use this class on a Gold run. Enjoy!

Appearance:

A8 A16 (Green Primary, Black Highlight)

-Lucien Midnight

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