How you would improve the MEA Cast?

Sam doesn't really bother me, except for having to go on the occasional trek to see it in person. I'm fairly ambivalent either way.

Cora always felt a little one-dimensional to me: too much professional soldier and professional asari wannabe, too little actual personality of her own. In some ways she reminds me of my initial encounter with Cassandra but where you got to see who Cassandra was and why, and her other foibles and interests, it felt like they never really expanded on those first impressions of Cora. Pity, I think she could've had more potential.

I'd like a competent Liam, whereas the Liam we got seemed like a teenager who hasn't got to grips with tidying his room. I'd half expected him to go "aaaaw, mum!" at me whenever he didn't get his way.

I agree with Drack. He's a fairly typical krogan but is a really fun character.

Jaal: agreed. I went all the way to Andromeda to meet the drippy angarans?

Vetra, that's a possibility. I quite liked her though she did seem in essence very much like a female Garrus. I liked the rivalry from her over-excitable younger sister.

I like Peebee, probably my other favourite character besides Drack, though I wish she'd lose the novelty make-up, at least occasionally. Fortunately someone's modded it out so if I go back to Andromeda I'll install that.

I think Suvi (and presumably Gil) could do with a bit more involvement. Even if you romance her, for the most part she just seems like one of the fittings. She also has a bit of an "Essex suntan" vibe going on. And poor Kallo! I like Kallo, even if he is named after a corn cake.

Yeah, I can see that now that you mention it.  I think it's additionally compounded by their overall characterisation: I don't think it was bad, just that there wasn't really enough of it and without quite enough polish, which is a criticism I've also made about Andromeda in general.  I think it was actually a good enough game overall, but had Bioware really invested themselves in it I think it could've been great with just a little more effort.

For me I would boot them all besides Drack and maybe Cora and Vetra. Going into Andromeda I thought the story was suppose to be this gritty fight or die type story, with equivalent characters supporting that narrative. Instead we got clowns. Everyone was basically Liam but dialed a little back and everything was always made a joke. I wanted more characters like Jack, Zaeed, or Samara. I wanted more serious characters, that had interesting backgrounds. But no one did. Everyone just felt flat, as did the story.

I didn't care much for Samara, but I get what you're aiming at. The MEA characters are painfully normal in comparison. There's so little baggage for them to carry. Yeah, that might be one of the requirements for something like the Andromeda Initiative, but from a story telling perspective, normal is boring.

Remember Canderous and HK 47 from KOTOR? Yeah, how come we dont get those companions anymore in Bioware games?

MEA cast was too nice and "safe".

I wouldn't change any of the current lot, but I would have loved a more renegade companion.

I haven't even finished one playthrough yet (But I'm trying!), I've gotten past Remnant City (Is that vague enough to not need a spoiler tag? I'm lazy), and honestly, hate most of the cast. Anybody not named Vetra, Drack, or Jaal needed and early option to shoot and airlock, the characters are so distasteful to me that I hate having to deal with them. Even Jaal needed a few slaps to break him out of his BS, but I still romanced him, because he was tolerable.

Liam is just a goddamned moron who had no place on my ship, let alone in Crisis Response, he is an irresponsible loose cannon, I wouldn't trust him to mow my lawn, he might just run over the neighbour's cat. He should've been a lot calmer, and think about the consequences of his actions before acting like a teenager and trying to pick up the pieces. Having been in Crisis Response, he should've seen the consequences of ill-advised, poorly thought out, rash decisions, and have bent all of his will to avoiding doing that. Instead, we have a whiny brat who wasn't disciplined enough as a child, and failed to learn from screwing up as an adult, so he jumped ship for a new start, good job, imbecile.

Cora was just a whiny brat, too. Every chance she got for half the game was whining about not being a pathfinder, then it was whining about needing someone to tell her what to do like some spineless twat who doesn't belong in such a position to begin with. I'm suprised the Asari Huntresses put up with her (Or maybe they kicked her out, and that's why she has such issues? Excluded from the cool club?). She should've been more like Samara, or even Jacob (as much hate as he gets), instead, we get yet another whiny teenager who failed to learn from life's lessons.

As for Peebee, the whole game would've been better if I'd gotten a Renegade option to shoot her in the head the moment she entered the scene, which would have fixed her inclusion 100%. Cannot stand ANY aspect of her. And most importantly, she needs to learn the meaning of the word "no". At best, she's mentally a child.

Jaal's ONLY problem (and it's not really a problem), is that he never made it out of the late-teens, early-adult part of his life. Before Ryder came along, he did his job, what the thought was expected of him, but never once stopped to figure out what HE wanted, and where he fit into the equation.

The Angara as a whole offer an interesting counter-point to races like the Vorcha and Krogan and Batarians, who took the beating of the past, and became stronger. The Angara were broken by the Kett, they like to think that they're still strong, and resisting, but they were broken, they didn't just lose their civilization, they lost their spark. Some people (and races) break when beaten, some become stronger and strike back, it's good to be reminded that not everybody in a video game or story is hero material, some just need to be the example of what could've been, and the Angarans fit that.

Just a brief point on Gil/Kallo/Suvi, Suvi feels totally out of place, like a late addition because there was a pod to fill on the ark/nexus, I never really feel like she's really as capable as the others, and things are just attributed to her because everybody else had already accomplished enough. Gil/Kallo constantly arguing was a point of frustration for me, every single conversation between them needed a "bang their heads together and tell them to grow up" option, like most of the cast, these two need a MASSIVE dose of maturity.

PS; I guess I didn't address Ryder, I've played as Sara, and whilst I thought I would hate them, starting out as whiny and incompetent as they were, as a character, they grew, and learnt, and matured, this pretty much gives them a free pass for me, even if I don't like them personally, they grew as a person. I don't hate them anymore, but I still prefer FemShep.

I would of added a volus to the mix he would be the goofy silly type always with a pistol at the ready and ready for duty looking for his next big gig .

Alter Gill's race to a Quarian and subsequently remove Jill's subplot. Instead, add a subplot about Quarian arc and maybe a subplot where Ryder and him can instead explore the traditional Quarian garb vs alterations that maybe make the faces visible, and what this means, etc choices.

For Jaal, I would start his story as it was, but add a plot twist that allows Akksul shoot him when Jaal insists to let him take the shot, and go on with a subplot with a hostile Angara on the team (maybe as a punishment for Jaal's murder/some sort of the emotional Angara thing/rule) instead of the infinitely friendly one after that as an honor-bound prisoner.

Just speaking in general:
1) the game should've either started in training camp on earth/luna to build team chemistry before going on that big voyage to Andromeda or pretended like everyone already knows each other well. Pathfinder team should be a team of specialists fit together perfectly before the start of the mission.
2) give the Andromeda mission an official goal (even if it turns out to be fake) for which specialists were signed up instead of the bunch of misfits we got (speaking of the whole Initiative, not the Pathfinder team) that simply go because they were bored of the Milky Way.
3) Once I get in charge of the Pathfinder team, let me decide who stays/gets on the team or let Initiative command make those decision based on mission needs instead of people just jumping on my ship.

Those three points would have been a good starting point for a great team of characters IMO that could've resulted in more interesting squad interactions and conversations, because we could've scrapped the "who are you and why did you join up" conversations.

I think the MEA crew have all great potential, they only need more conflict/situations to shine.

SAM would need to develop some indipendence of thinking, and depending on the Ryder actions, go either towards a more "human" and sentimental logic, or a more aseptic and cinic thinking. Having him for a mission in an artificial body without the chance to have all his knowledge and power would have him actually put at use the teaching Ryder gave him somehow.

Jaal need some more "alieness", like the all the Angara race. Since they seem to actually have the memories of their ancestors, having more in depht of this stuff would be good. Expecially if it unravel misteries like the crazy IA in the ice planet.

Liam need to take out his professionalism at least once. Or having the chance to actually, finally, mature a bit.

Cora would need some confrontation either with the Asari culture that she seem to like so much (like knowing the Justicars) or some biotic-haters or crazy biotics groups. Having the name Harper having an actual connection with TIM and Cerberus would be great. (In the worst case, having her decide to rebuld Cerberus and becaming an enemy after some bad stuff happening to her would be great)

Gil would need a rewarp of his relationship with Jill. I think the writer wanted a sort of Will and Grace relationship, that were great friends had the agreement of having a kid together because they were both single. But since Jill had no character presentation, the situation came out horribly. Having Jill already married or in love with another person (be it another woman, or any alien that is not an Asari, or a guy with fertility problems), and Gil having just to be the donator, but deciding to help her with the kid because said person is dead or lost somewere, would have helped a lot. Frankly I think a resolution to the Jill situation, and more focus on his engineer task would be great for the character.

PeeBee...well, I don't know... maybe having her be less childish would help. I can see her develop into a character like River Song-Asari version.

Vetra need something more than "I'm a Turian but not really". Some look into life outside Turian culture, like how do other Turian approac her and Sid? Did she ever wanted to know more about it? How would she react to Sid wanting to return to the Turian culture in a "finding herself" journey common to teens? And how about some anedoctes and actual space smuggler action? More depth needed here.

Kallo, like Suvi, for me just needed some mission of their own outside the Tempest, and some screentime. Them and Drak for me are the best done characters in the game.

Give Vetra the same love and attention as the rest of the cast.

Have Cora tone down the Asari worship just a little.

Utilize all four of Riders dialogue options more. Allow it so he can agree and disagree more.