logic in the choice of companions (suicide mission)

Vents: It varies. Some of my Shepards use Tali and I rarely use Legion (prefer to use him on the second fireteam). Mostly, I prefer to use Kasumi to give her relevance as she does jack shit and is barely integrated into the galaxy at large from a story standpoint whereas Zaeed helped found one of most influential and infamous mercenary bands and served in the Alliance navy. So yeah, Kasumi's typically my #1 pick here.

Fireteam Leader 1: Miranda. People will disagree but when they come out alive and well on the other side, she earns their respect.

Shepard's initial team: Jack and Thane nearly 100% of the time. Thane's warp is great for wrecking Harbinger and Jack's pull fields and heavy shockwave help toss mobs off the edges to get rid of unshielded mooks quicker. Thane typically gets placed in the rear and in a high location to snipe while I run point and Jack is placed at mid range.

Barrier: Romanced Jack and if not romanced, Samara. I typically bring Jacob and Zaeed or Grunt with me here. Both are somewhat tanky and with Jacob rocking a Geth Shotgun or Eviscerator and Zaeed using a Vindicator or Grunt using a Claymore, they make for great crowd control.

Fireteam leader 2: Garrus. He's the man to lead the assault squad through the toughest portions of the attack. That and Its always cool to see Garrus bail out Shepard.

Escort: Mordin for reason listed in prior posts he makes the most sense. Good at keeping a low profile and isn't the best choice to be launching a direct assault. Our Salarian Madlad showed on Omega how much a a wolf in sheep's clothing he was in defending groups of people with minimal help. Plus when they arrived he gets to treat wounds.

Shepard's final team: Tali and Legion are my favorites for utility as their drones can keep Scions distracted but Miranda is my favorite from a story standpoint. It better cements her arc in ME3 to see her tell TIM she's done.

I try to give everyone an important role to play and keep the whole squad rotated to an extent. Dmn it, I wish ME3 had a similar mission. Though I'm glad you see all your allies in direct action come MEA. That felt like a bigger scale than Priority: IWASBORNINLONDON. ME2 has the greatest final mission EVER.

Hmm, lemme think about this.

I never use Kasumi, Jack, Tali, Jacob or Miranda for anything if I'm doing a everyone survives pt.

Vents: Legion. He can hack a variety of systems (I assume) and being a robot/synthetic/computer or what have you, I also assume he can do so faster than an organic like Tali.

First Fire Team: Garrus. My Shepard doesn't trust Miranda and they choose Garrus knowing he has the experience of leading teams and the experience of saving the galaxy in ME1.

Barrier: Samara. My Shepard believes that jack is too unstable to trust for something so important. (Sometimes I do choose Miranda for this so she can fail to wipe the smug superiority off her face just before taking her to the reaper to let her die. lulz)

Second Fire Team: Garrus once again. As I said, my Shepard trusts Garrus with his life and doesn't hesitate to lead Garrus lead the other team.

Escort: This one varies with Mordin, Grunt, Zaeed, and Thane. Reasoning being:

- Mordin: He's a Doctor/Scientist. He can treat anyone that needs it once they return to the ship. STG Agent meaning he knows how to stealth.
- Zaeed/Grunt: Sometimes I feel like what if they run into trouble on the way back? Who would best be able to draw fire and distract the enemies. These two come to mind, especially Grunt. Who's going to run after colonists with a rampaging Krogan on their case?
- Thane. Assassin/Stealth Specialist. Also has biotics. Can kill enemies quickly, Possibly help keep group hidden and if seeker swarms show up, can hold up a barrier to get them to safety.

Hold the Line: Any big guns I have left. Garrus/Grunt/Zaeed. Samara to defend allies with barriers.

Usually take the weak members with Shepard. So I guess Tali/Jacob/etc do get some work here. But it's not because of any expertise, just lack of usefulness at holding a battlefield.

Tali has a sealed, safe-contained suit and thus should theoretically hold up to the heat better. Kasumi has at best, a face mask.

underlined: Speak for yourself but also, in-universe not technically true. By that point, the team's been through some shit and proved at least some of themselves to each other. Jack mouths off because Jack, but the rest are more levelheaded. Besides, there's a difference between "I don't trust Cerberus in general" and "I don't trust this person to not feed me to bugs in the middle of their hideout on this life-or-death mission we've all signed up for". The latter is nonsensical. Moreover, going through one by one, I think most people are perfectly fine with Miranda (Jacob is a non-issue, being both more moderate and less higher up in the chain of command)

-Jack hates her, obviously.
-Tali hates Cerberus.
But
-Mordin is professional and perfectly fine working with Cerberus
-Grunt gives zero fucks
-Thane is professional, and also gives zero fucks as it's more of a suicide mission for him than most
-Legion gives zero fucks because he's geth
-Zaeed gives zero fucks because mercenary
-Kasumi gives zero fucks because thief
-Jacob is Cerberus, thus already loyal
-Garrus does shake his head, but he trusts Shepard and ultimately he's a turian and turians follow orders.

Legion says the geth back Shepard and the geth do not lie or (intentionally) infiltrate. And again, what would the geth gain by sabotaging Shepard's mission, and doing it in the Collector base, as opposed to sooner?


Anyway my picks:
Vents: Legion. Highest reaction times and hacking capability, highest environmental tolerance. There's literally no reason to choose anyone else if you have him.
Fire Team: Garrus. Has experience, also protege needs to keep learning, get out from my shadow and get over previous failure. I would 100% trust Miranda but I want her by my side. Jacob could do it but he's third string.
Bubble: Samara. Thousand year old Justicar, superior asari biotics, vs unstable nutjob? No contest.
Escort: Mordin. I think I metagamed this one because I heard he's the squishiest in any other role, but he does have the qualifications.

Squadmates: Miranda, Kasumi. Always.

I vary it up depending on the personality of my Shepard in that playthrough. What follows though is probably my favorite:

Vents: Tali - her suit should protect her better than Kasumi's gear and Legion is too new an addition to the team to be really trusted yet.
Alternate Team Leader (1st instance) - Jacob (since it is a Cerberus mission) and Jack makes an effective argument against Miranda. He's capable; and presuming I've done Jacob's loyalty mission, he just needs to prove to himself that he's a better leader than his father was.
Shepard's Team: Miranda and Jack - keeping the trouble makers close with both of them taking their orders from me.
Escort - Mordin, he has the medical and fighting background to get the crew back.
Second Team Leader - Morinth - My excuse is to send a strong biotic with that team in case a barrier is needed for that team as well. This does result in Morinth dying in a matter that sort of redeems herself in that she dies ensuring that the others get through alive.
Barrier - Jack with Miranda and Thane. Jack and Miranda are still where I can keep a close eye on them and neither one is taking orders from the other. I don't really have any logic for choosing Thane here other than I use his throw skill on the husks. I will also sometime use Garrus here if I've equipped him with concussive blast.
Final Team - Miranda and Jack (still keeping the trouble-makers close). This way, Miranda gets to actually quit Cerberus while on the mission and it just makes more sense to me going into #3.