Platinum Solo with the Batarian Vanguard (Devices / Retrieval / Boss)

Near the end of my attempts on my Batarian Vanguard Platinum Solo, I was able to successfully pull off three Wave 2 Hacks, one of which I got done with minimal consumable usage. I’m happy to say that I’ve been able to do all the Platinum objectives solo, although the Wave 2 Upload I did with the Human Juggernaut with the Go For the Eyes (200% weak point bonus) modifier. My Mass Effect Andromeda Platinum life is now complete.

That said, I don’t think it’s possible for me to do a solo Wave 4 or Wave 6 Hack or Upload because of the Fiend (Wave 4) and the Berserkers and Behemoths (Wave 6) are too fast and bum-rush you constantly.

Please enjoy!

I was unsure about that too. TheThirdRace’s builder says it boosts weapon, power, and melee damage in the tooltip. I hope it did, otherwise I would have wasted a booster slot.

It does boost weapon, power and melee damage.

This was found out by peddroelm I think.

Bioware would gain a lot by being clear about what things do. It would help players to elevate themselves to higher difficulties and perform well. It's also a lot less frustrating to know from the get go than learning it after 400 hours of play...

Chapeaux to you, vanelsa!
I love the Batguard, and you have definitely rocked him out!
One question: why do you need receiver mods on the guns when behind cover? (I have only found them useful when shooting through walls, and that is not affected by shooting from cover. Am I missing something?)

I'm not sure I understood what the question was exactly, so if my intervention isn't up to snuff, please disregard


Receiver Mods

Receiver mods will allow all projectile weapons to pass thru obstacles.

Beam (P.A.W., Shadow, etc.) and Energy weapons (Thokin, Silesh) won't work with Receiver mods. Some projectile weapons are bugged and don't do damage, I think the Vanquisher is still bugged, but it could have been fixed since...

An obstacle can be anything: a wall, a panel, a box, a teammate and even enemies.

As a side note, Recon Visor works with all weapons, not just projectile ones and it stacks with Receiver mods for a maximum of 100% damage thru obstacles.


Teammates, Enemies and Receiver Mods

The teammate and enemies parts are often forgotten, but these are probably the best use out of Receiver mods.

If you're not using a Receiver mod and a teammate gets in the way while trying to shoot an enemy, your shot ends there, it never reach any enemy and doesn't do any damage.

With a Receiver mod, you can go thru your teammate without any problem. But the usefulness doesn't end there. Let's say you're in a room holding a Hack. If no one has a Receiver on, most of the time only 1 out of 4 players will hit whatever is coming at you because there's always someone in the way. It considerably reduce the collective DPS. But if everyone has a Receiver mod, every single shot will hit, considerably increasing the collective DPS, which in turn helps hold the hack much more easily and keep everyone alive. Not to mention that now people don't have to go out of their way to find a clear line of sight to shoot, they just need to shoot toward the enemy and voila!

Receiver mods aren't only useful to go thru your teammates, they go thru multiple enemies too. When you see 2 enemies lined up, you can hit both of them with the same bullet, effectively doubling your DPS. Consider it like a very linear AOE damage. Without the Receiver mod, the projectile would stop at the first enemy, which is fine and all, but it could be much better...


How the damage is calculated?

This one is easy, you take the normal damage and multiply it by the % penetration.

If your gun does a total of 1000 damage per shot and the Receiver mod is 50%, anything that goes thru cover deals 500 damage (1000 * 0.5). Much better than 0 damage...


What is cover?

Something that is often misunderstood is how cover is actually calculated by the game.

First, when out of cover you take a whooping 40% more damage! That's why we melt so fast, we don't take 40% less damage while in cover, we take more damage when out of cover. If an enemy is supposed to deal 100 damage per shot, anything that hits you while in cover will deal 100 damage while anything outside of cover will deal 140 damage.

Second, cover is not necessarily only when blind firing. Anytime you see the shield icon in the HUD, the game considers you in cover. This means that when you're behind a small panel and get up to shoot, you still have your cover status and take the normal damage. You can be facing backward or forward and it won't make a shred of difference. Move just a bit out of cover and you'll melt...

A very good strategy with the Human Juggernault is to find a very open spot where enemies can shoot at you easily. Find a little cover in the vicinity, not a wall, where you can stand there like a big target, but still be technically behind cover. Get your Siphon weapon and shoot away, you will almost never die. Even on Platinum, you can stand there like a dummy and shoot everything as long as you use a Siphon weapon with good damage, the Shorty being one of the best for its damage, range and accuracy.


Conclusion

Learning the game mechanics and taking advantage of them is what makes a good player. The more you know how things work together, the more you can devise strategies to overwhelm the enemies.