Three Trick Pony by JayneCobb88

Build Title: Three Trick Pony

 

Class: Asari Huntress Infiltrator

 

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

 

Power Evolutions:
Tactical Cloak: Duration (4), Melee Damage (5), Bonus Power (6)
Dark Channel: Damage (4)
Warp: Detonate (4), Expose (5), Pierce (6)
Asari Adept: Damage & Capacity (4)
Fitness: Melee Damage (4), Martial Artist (5), Power Synergy (6)

 

Weapons:
Primary: Reegar Carbine with Omni-Blade and Shredder Mod
Secondary: SMG with Ultalight Materials and other mod
Hurricane – Heat Sink, Collector SMG – Extended Mag, other SMG – your mod choice

 

Gear:
This build is all about the Incendiary Ammo, even if all you have is level I, use that. Hydraulic Joints, Juggernaut Shield or Berserker Package are all solid choices. Don’t bother with a shotgun amp, the Reegar does plenty of damage for our purposes.

 

Strategy:
As the name implies, Three Trick Pony has three distinctly different ways to attack.
Trick #1: Cloak, close the distance to the target, Warp, Reegar. This attack gets you within the Reegar’s 10m range safely and allows Warp to nearly always hit. Warp will do several things for this attack plan; stagger the target, increase weapon damage by 15%, reduce armor effectiveness by half and along with the Shredder Mod negates armor reduction entirely. The best thing though is an exploit of Warp’s DOT mechanic. Warp’s DOT damage is registered by the game as incendiary ammo damage. This means shooting the target with incendiary ammo will stack the ammo damage to Warp’s DOT which turns into tens of thousands of damage done to the target over the next 5 seconds that the incendiary ammo does its DOT. And the more times the ammo damage is applied, the more extreme the damage becomes. Simply put, Warp + Incendiary Ammo allows the Reegar to melt armor in addition to health, shields and barriers. Your SMG sidearm is great for situations in which you want to keep your distance while still using the same Warp + Incendiary Ammo tactic.
Trick #2: When necessary the Pony can play it safe by cloaking and hitting a target with Dark Channel. The player can let the DOT do its thing or launch a Warp while still cloaked for a powerful BE. It’s a little counter intuitive but both the Huntress and N7 Shadow can do more damage reliably with Tactical Cloak duration + bonus power than with Tac Cloak damage. Taking duration also allows for better utility for objectives, reviving teammates and running to safety for shield recovery. A longer duration also allows for a heavier weapon load out since there is more time to attack cancel out of cloak and take the automatic 3 second cool down. Also of note, the Huntress’
Tactical Cloak damage bonus only applies to melee and power attacks, which relieves the mental pressure to fire your weapon while cloaked and makes taking cloak duration over damage less of a loss than it is on other classes.
Trick #3: The asari heavy melee when used correctly can utterly wreck crowds. First off, the good qualities; the asari heavy biotic blast is area of attack, does respectable damage to health and receives a 50% increase vs shields, barriers and armor. Now the bad qualities; slow to execute, won’t hit through walls and has a one second recovery period. Counter the first two problems by cloaking a good distance away from your targets and carefully choosing your point of attack. Counter the one second recovery time by making sure you’ve already got a heavy melee kill within the past 30 seconds before attacking a shielded foe, ensuring their death in one blow. You can also hit them with Dark Channel or Warp either on approach or just before the melee.

 

N00b Rating:
2 – Since the Three Trick Pony has so many different ways to attack she is adaptable to any situation or any enemy and is an awesome team player with her cloak built for utility. And having so many ways to attack just makes her a blast to play.
GD Star Rating
loading...
Share

Avatar of Vengeance – by JayneCobb88

Build Title: Avatar of Vengeance

Class: Awakened Collector Adept

Map Difficulty Rating: This build has the potential for Platinum Gameplay.

Power Evolutions:
Dark Sphere: (4) Explosion Damage, (5) Recharge Speed, (6) Unstable Dark Sphere
Seeker Swarm: (4) Recharge Speed, (5) Damage Reduction
Dark Channel: (1), (2), (3)
Vengeful Ancient: (4) Damage & Capacity, (5) Power Damage, (6) Collector/Prothean Weapon Damage
Ancient Warrior: (4) Ascension Damage Bonus, (5) Shield Recharge, (6) Fitness Expert

 

Weapons:
Prothean Particle Rifle with Extended Barrel and Magazine Upgrade or Collector Sniper Rifle with Extended Barrel and Piercing Mod. The Prothean Rifle has the advantage for boss killing and the Collector Sniper Rifle is better at shwacking mooks. As well as the Acolyte with Ultralight HP Materials and Power Magnifier for trashing boss barriers/shields. It’s not necessary to carry the Acolyte when using the Particle Rifle except when facing Phantoms.

 

Gear:
Warp Ammo is a MUST and anything that increases Assault/Sniper Rifle damage, shield strength or power recharge also help.

 

Strategy:
The Avatar of Vengeance deals his damage not by spamming Dark Sphere for its explosions but for its biotic priming and following up with warp enhanced particle beams and Seeker Swam biotic explosions. That’s the strategy in a nutshell.
The complex version is this:
Dark Sphere operates in two stages. Stage One is casting in which the sphere is tossed out and sticks to walls without causing a cool-down. Once stuck to a wall the dissipation timer starts which is equal to the DOT duration, 7 sec for this build. At the end of that time the sphere is gone and another can be cast without triggering a cooldown. The Dark Sphere will cause DOT damage and bioticly prime enemies within a radius equal to the detonation radius, 7 meters for this build. Stage Two is initiated by casting the power a second time before the sphere has dissipated, setting off a large blast, causing massive damage and triggering the power’s cool-down. This means the player can use this power without ever triggering its horrendously long cool-down. The downside is no big blast. The upside is that right after throwing a Dark Sphere down a hall the player can immediately cast Dark Channel. Unfortunately, Dark Sphere is NOT a detonating power so a blast from Dark Sphere will not trigger a biotic explosion , only prime them. This leaves Seeker Swarms as the Collector Adept’s sole method of detonating biotic explosions. Rarely have I found myself tossing out more than 2 swarms and while 3 can happen, 4 almost never did. Additionally the total health gained is greater from Fitness Expert (6) than from an extra seeker 10% damage
reduction. The swarms also prime biotic explosions for the duration that they slow down the target, 4 sec with this build.
Since all abilities prime biotic explosions the collector is a natural team player for any other adept or vanguard. Collector dodges are similar to Turian jump jets which mean they can be used effectively for both dodging and locomotion. Ascension mode is an awesome tool but situational so not worth investing fully in. The Avatar of Vengeance is fast and has decent but not amazing shields so use this to your advantage by staying in cover to shoot and use dodges to reach new cover. Staying in cover provides 40% damage reduction and the Seeker Swarms brings that total to a beefy 70%. Using particle weapons frees the Avatar from having to make ammo runs. Lateral dodges can be used to cancel the Seeker Swarm animation.
Specific Tactics:
Single trooper – Dark Channel to stagger and start shooting with particle rifle/collector sniper rifle, if need be, toss a swarm to detonate the biotic explosions and stagger a second time if it doesn’t kill the enemy outright.
Single boss – Dark Channel, unload your weapon into them and watch ‘em melt. Do not detonate the Dark Channel with a Seeker Swarm before shooting. Doing so eliminates the biotic priming, preventing the warp ammo from doing “extra damage vs lifted target”
Multiple troopers – Dark Sphere into group, immediately cast Dark Channel, Ascension Mode heavy melee, detonate Dark Sphere if you wish, detonate biotic explosions with swarms, sprinkle weapons fire through out the process.
Multiple bosses – Ascension Mode heavy melee, Dark Channel, melt with weapon, Dark Channel and shoot next target.
Rushed by many enemies – Dark Sphere and immediately detonate to stagger, use forewing dodges to egress. If desired, turn and detonate biotic explosions with swarms.
Phantoms – Dark Sphere aimed at where the targets will be, hit one phantom with Dark Channel, shoot another with acolyte, detonate Dark Sphere to kill one phantom and drop the barriers of the second. Leave and let the combined DOTs do their thing.
Dragoons – Launching a Seeker Swarm is the fastest power that will both stagger and bioticly prime Dragoons, setting up follow on weapons fire.

 

N00b Rating:
3.5 – Takes some getting used to and requires some rare equipment but quickly melting through both bosses and crowds is just amazing. The hardest thing about Vengeance is knowing when it’s a good idea/safe to detonate Dark Sphere and suffer the recharge.
GD Star Rating
loading...
Share

Shadow Walker – by Cory Conrad

Build Title: Shadow Walker

Class: Asari Huntress Infiltrator

Map Difficulty Rating: This build has the potential for Gold gameplay, Platinum may be possible as part of a well-structured team.

Power Evolutions:
Tactical Cloak: (4) Damage, (5) Recharge Speed, (6) Bonus Power
Dark Channel: (4) Damage, (5) Recharge Speed, (6) Pierce
Warp: (4) Detonate, (5) Lasting Damage, (6) Pierce
Asari Huntress: (4) Damage & Capacity, (5) Power Damage
Fitness: (1), (2), (3)

 

Weapons:
Anything that will keep you at or near 200%. You probably don’t want to dip any lower than 180%. I prefer the Phalanx with the pierce and extended clip mods or the Hurricane with heat sink and stability.

 

Gear:
Commando and Expert Packages are the two obvious choices, due to their weapon/biotic bonuses. Ammo: Warp is great for the biotic damage boost, and Disruptor helps fight down those pesky shields. Armor: Power Amplifiers or Efficiency Modules are no-brainers.

 

Strategy:
First, let me talk about the powers, then we’ll get right down to it. Despite this being an Infiltrator class, its powers and design are what we’ve come to expect from Adepts: the final level of Huntress can even decrease the weight of heavy pistols. The mindset of the Huntress is more Adept with a Cloak than an Infiltrator with Biotics. Cloak, rather than building up the Huntress’s firepower, is perfect for maximizing her Biotic power. I took Bonus Power at (6) so I could cast Dark Channel and Warp with Cloak’s bonus damage for optimum output. For Dark Channel: I took damage over duration because the base duration is 30s and the cooldown is a measly 2.22 at 200%. At 6, I chose Pierce because +75% Damage to Armor AND Barriers is a no-brainer. Since this setup uses Warp to detonate rather than set, I chose Lasting Damage and Detonate, and went with Pierce to maximize Armor damage. Huntress boosts power damage. Fitness is self-explanatory.
You play like a power-spamming Adept. You set with Dark Channel, then detonate with Warp. The beauty of Dark Channel is that detonating it does NOT remove its effects, meaning it continues to damage the victim and will jump to another enemy when the first dies, provided a second is near enough. Only one enemy can be Channeled at any given time, but the ability’s base duration is a whopping twenty seconds! More than enough time to kill a few baddies. So in-game strategy becomes simple: Channel an enemy, Warp-detonate, and finish them off with a few rounds. Just one cycle will kill your standard troopers, Nemesis, Rocket troops, and even a Phantom (!!!) provided you can put the shots down range quick enough. Otherwise throw on another Dark Channel and it’ll put her down. For your boss- and special-type enemies, it’s just a matter of repetition: Cloak, Channel, Warp.
To maximize efficiency, however, this class needs to coordinate with teammates. The idea is simple, really: shoot the glowy guy. With all guns- and biotics- trained on this foe, they will fall in the blink of an eye. Then it’s on to the next glowing goon, and his imminent demise. Just recast Channel after every biotic explosion so your enemies are ready to explode again! It’s really that simple. As with all Adepts, take cover with bullets are flying, and remember you have Cloak to worm your way out of sticky situations. And remember to have fun, because it’s still just a game.
Normally I’m not too concerned with score so long as I’m making my medals and being a help rather than a hindrance. That said, I was AMAZED at how high I consistently scored, and I was simply astounded at how often my DC or Warp-detonation scored boss kills. Even when I didn’t score the kill, my assists were usually 1200-1600 depending on the boss/special, so I don’t think score-hounds will be disappointed.

 

N00b Rating:
2 or 2.5 - It’s powerful in its own right, but mastery comes with learning to coordinate with your team to truly channel the darkness (see what I did there?).
GD Star Rating
loading...
Share

Angel of Darkness – by CoreyImperia

Build Title: Angel of Darkness

Class: Asari Huntress Infiltrator

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

Power Evolutions:
Tactical Cloak: (4) Damage, (5) Recharge Speed, (6) Power Damage
Dark Channel: (4) Damage, (5) Slow, (6) Pierce
Warp: (4) Detonate, (5) Expose, (6) Pierce
Asari Huntress: (4) Weapon Damage, (5) Power Damage
Fitness: (1), (2), (3)

 

Weapon:
I recommend the M-11 Wraith with High-Velocity Barrel and Smart Choke. You want weapons with heavy damage but that are not too heavy themselves. Because there is that convenient bug which means non-DLC weapons like the Wraith are not affected by the weight penalty, you can get away with having a high-level Wraith with the High-Velocity Barrel. If you do not have the Wraith, use another shotgun like the Eviscerator with the same mods or the Geth Plasma Shotgun with Spare Thermal Clip and High Caliber Barrel. I’d also recommend the Cerberus Harrier with Extended Magazine and Piercing Mod, but I do prefer the Wraith on her. You might benefit from taking the Acolyte with Heavy Pistol Barrel (High Caliber Barrel if you don’t have that) and Ultralight Materials with you, but that is completely up to you.

 

Gear:
I recommend Warp Rounds, for more damage against targets affected by Biotics and as compensation for a lack of Weapon Damage (which I’ll talk about later). For your weapon bonus you’ll want Shotgun Rail Amps (unless using the Harrier, the Assault Rifle Rail Amps) and for your armor bonus you’ll need Cyclonic Modulators or if you are feeling risky, Power Amplifier Modules. As for the gear itself, I use Adaptive War Amp for the increase in Biotic Damage.

 

Strategy:
The Asari Huntress was a very interesting character to say the least, she was an Infitrator that had biotics. This means a different playstyle. Especially because you cannot use her in the same ways you’d use other Infitrators as she is soley based around Powers. I’ll go over the build, then the factions and end with the difficulties she has.
When she was first released, we thought her Tactical Cloak was bugged because when you fired weapons in it, it did no more damage. But strangely, this is what BioWare wanted. It only affects Powers and Melee, and by taking Damage its a massive 120% Damage bonus to Powers. Recharge Speed on Tactical Cloak is better because this isn’t a melee build. At Rank 6 you have the choice between Bonus Power and Power Damage; I go for Damage because I want maximum Damage for the Powers, and this brings it to 160%. Bonus Power is definitely viable if you want to be ‘safer’ as in throw of explosions cloaked; but overall I think the extra Power Damage is better in the long run. For Dark Channel, having the Damage is overall better than the Duration: Dark Channel already lasts 30.00 seconds, and that extra damage-over-time has you thieving kills the whole match. Slow is about the best ability on Dark Channel, especially when you’ve got it on bosses, Brutes, Dragoons and Phantoms. Finally, Pierce for extra Armor and Barrier damage. On Warp it is the standard you-should-always-use spec; Detonate as it is her detonator power, Expose to weaken everything and Pierce for extra Armor and Barrier damage. On her passive, I go for Weapon Damage then Power Damage; the reason I do not take Damage & Capacity is because she doesn’t need the capacity and the power Biotic Explosions aren’t affected by any power damage bonuses you have, because you have two level 6 powers, you create a level 12 explosion. Finally, three in Fitness because she’s squishy. Still squishy, but better than 500/500.
As most biotics are, she is best against Reapers or Collectors, fairs well against Cerberus and sometimes struggles with Geth. Only because both of her biotics have a 0.5 damage multiplier against shields. This is another reason we went for maximum damage on Tactical Cloak, to help overcome this and make her more useful against other factions, hence how she can do Platinum. Troopers fall to Dark Channel, your weapon and explosions (if they survive long enough, as a Dark Channel then a Wraith shot should kill most weaker troopers). Anything armored like Geth Pyros and Dragoons sometimes stagger when hit with biotics, and Dark Channel and Warp will easily tear their armor away. Phantoms will fall pretty easily if you leave them to die to Dark Channel, but once Dark Channel is on them your weapon causes more damage to them. Explosions love Ravagers, Scions and Brutes as it annihilates them. Dark Channel has a field day on Swarmers, jumping through all of them and then into the Ravager. Scions are susceptible to Wraith shots on the tumors which greatly weaken their armor if you break them. This is hard to do without Armor-Piercing Ammo, but you have High-Velocity Barrel so you should be fine. These enemies aren’t particular tough to kill, though Ravager slime is deadly to this class (with 625 health and 625 shields I mean). As for the big bosses, Banshees and Praetorians are the easiest. Use your Biotic Explosions with Wraith shots in-between. You’ll normally find that Dark Channel will finish them off eventually if you keep shooting them or keep applying explosions. Altases and Primes resist half of your biotic damage with their shields, but take 2.25 times more damage when its down to armor, work with your team to get their shields down and then ravage them with bullets and explosions.
This class relies heavily on powers, this prevents you from taking heavy weapons which reacts poorly on your overall DPS (high DPS is essential for Platinum); but the Wraith or Harrier both compensate for that. Her cloak disguises her for 5.20 seconds, not enough for objectives and it gives no bonus to weapon damage yet that will still break cloak, so be careful. Finally, she’s frail. Even with Cyclonic Modulator IV (which gives +150% shields), she only has 1375 shields and 625 health, which isn’t much compared to other classes. So be careful and make the best decisions. Stay with your team for protection for objectives and use Cloak often to hide from harm. You also have the neat Asari dodge to use, but be aware of the fact it drains your shields and if they are drained, it resets the Shield Recharge Time.

 

N00b Rating:
3.5 – The Asari Huntress takes a little getting used to, and I’ve found times where I think I’m playing an Adept and totally forget about Tactical Cloak so be careful not to do that. On top of that, she is frail like most Asari you don’t Fitness spec but she has the added benefit of Tactical Cloak for quick get aways. You’ll find yourself making more Dark Channel kills and Biotic Explosion kills than anything else and because you can debuff enemy speed and armor, you’re an assest to any Gold or Platinum team. Just be aware of your awesome dodge mechanic and how it drains your shields.
GD Star Rating
loading...
Share

Poisonous Fury – by G.J.

Build Title:
Poisonous Fury – by G.J.

Class:
N7 Fury Adept

Power Evolutions:
Annihilation field: Damage (4), Movement speed (5), Drain (6)
Dark Channel: Damage (4), Slow (5), Pierce (6)
Throw: Radius (4), Detonate (5), Force and Damage (6)
N7 Fury: Damage and capacity (4), Power damage (5)
Fitness: (1), (2), (3)

Weapons:
Pistols, SMGs some shotguns. Anything that keeps your
cooldown as close to 200%, since you’ll definitely need it for this
class.

Gear:
Commando or mental focuser, both work according to your choice.

Strategy:
The Fury is one of those classes that has extreme amounts of
potential. One type of game play method is high-risk-high-reward, the
one that this loadout utilizes. The annihilation field is basically
like a mini offensive justicar bubble that travels with you. With the
points i’ve used, it gives you extra damage, extra movement speed
(which is VERY useful and a must in this strategy), and returns your
shields on successful detonation. anything that gets close to you,
takes damage and has a warp effect added to it, which can be rapidly
detonated by using throw. This can work -very- well if you get near 1
enemy, apply the warp effect, detonate, then move to the next. You can
have chain detonations active, which will make short work of enemies
even on gold (though it goes without saying, on gold you have to be
even more careful from full-auto marauders :D ).

The dark channel power is actually -very- powerful, and makes short
work of bosses. use it in conjunction with the throw to rapidly
detonate the biotic explosions, it can even be just left on enemies
without detonating it to do the DoT effect, which does quite a bit of
damage. Throw is very important to have max’d so you can rapidly
detonate your combos/others’ combos. From the fury tree you just need
the first 5 evolutions to get the max power damage you can from it,
and fitness 1,2,3 should be enough for your survivability. If you feel
you need even more, you could perhaps drop throw evo 6 for it, but i’d
not recommend it.

N00b Rating: (scale 1-5, 1 is easy for everybody!)
4. on lower difficulties, this strategy is pretty easy to
pull off, but as you go into the harder difficulties, you have to be
even more cautious, and have to ensure that you’re not getting
flanked. the dodge ability is very useful to get out of tight
situations since you can teleport through thin walls and thus put some
distance between your enemies and you.

-edits by Lucien Midnight

GD Star Rating
loading...
Share