What did you do today in ME?

It seems to be either this or even more likely which squadmate you took most on missions. I always got the one being injured who I took with me on most missions, last time I actually had EDI because I took her with me all the time. I hope you'll get the result you want

That's part of it. The other is how many missions that squadmate has been taken on. Just use a squadmate that hasn't been used very much to have Kaidan be the one injured and talked to before entering the Normandy.

I recently replayed Mass Effect 1 with my sister making all the decisions and me actually piloting the game; skipping any boring fluff to make it more fun/quicker. We did the same thing for the whole DA series actually and I could probably write an essay on how that went. DA2 is actually her favorite game ever now. I feel like a typical Bioware protagonist's companion while playing; often flailing my arms in the air in that DA:O/DA2 fashion and complaining about her dumb decisions, but ultimately going along with it anyway. Right away, she did something I never did before by picking the boring spacer background to go along with war hero.

I usually would romance Liara regardless of Shepard's gender, but my sister wanted to play as a female Shepard and kept proclaiming "I'm not gay!" to the Liara suggestion. I told her that everyone is bisexual in Bioware games, but no dice. She cringed when I mentioned what could happen with Shiara. And yet she's one of those women who finds romancing Garrus to not be disgusting, with her eyebrows raising in amusement to the prospect of pursuing him in ME2. She's got this idea to do a Twilight-ish love triangle where she romances Kaidan in the first game (like Edward in the first film/book), have a daliance with Garrus (like Jacob) in the second while Kaidan (Edward) is away, but ultimately committing to Kaidan in the third game. Sigh.

As for choices, she was much more in the paragon camp. I vastly prefer renegade myself and even had a rule with my favorite Shepards to never pick a paragon persuasion. She's got this thing though where she doesn't like characters who question her authority (like in real life) or who whine a lot, which she considers to be "elfy." Note: She really liked Sera in DA:I because of this. With this mentality, there were times where she'd surprise me by being renegade like choosing to kill Balak over saving the hostages because he wouldn't stop complaining. She killed the rachni queen because she hated the idea of giant bugs with zombie abilities spreading in the galaxy. And the council died because they were annoying, but never hanged up on them though. She found Wrex annoying too but decided he wasn't annoying enough to kill him on Virmire, but believes the genophage is a good thing because of the krogans' nature. It will be interesting to see what she does in ME3 with Wrex...

Its definitely a great costume, but I think I prefer the Dr. Eva outfit for... reasons. I just wish you could have a costume as Dr. Eva though. That would have been cool.

And I think since Kaidan is your romance, he automatically will be the one to get injured no matter what right? He is just my friend so getting him would be tougher if I didn't know that talking to him and missions they have under their belt play a part in it. But while I agree getting your romance out of there makes a lot of sense, getting Kaidan out of there since he's best bro and been there since the beginning also makes sense to me.

Faith & Owen Shepard:

Faith: As I went further into the ExoGeni HQ, I found information showing they were engaged in some real shady stuff - like Binary Helix level of shadiness. Given how I felt about Ethan Jeong, it was a sure bet I was going to use this against him somehow. And then I found it. They were directly working with Cerberus. Damn. I hope Owen actually succeeded in taking them down and this is just old intel. Still, it meant ExoGeni also had to be taken out. Not sure how much even a Spectre can do against such a vast organization. Right after I found this I was finally able to remove the geth dropship powering the force shields around this place. Lizbeth Baynham was waiting for us outside of the building. I called her out on knowing more than she had said. The only reason I gave her a pass is because the reason she had stayed behind was to get a message out to Colonial Affairs asking for help. Hell of a lot more than that asshole who used the colonists as experiments.

I took Lizbeth with us to head back to the scientists to see if we could find a way to deal with the Thorian. Jeong investigated me while we were gone. He knew my reputation and he was afraid. Good. But he got in touch with ExoGeni and they told him to "purge" the colony, that the Thorian was more important than a few human lives. I wasn't about to let that happen. I'd gone to a lot of effort to help those colonists. I'd be damned if I let some pencil pusher wipe them out to make his balance sheets look good. I got him to back down, tell ExoGeni that the Thorian had been destroyed by the geth. Which was good because it saved his life.

Then Juliana Baynham asked if I could find a way to spare the colonists by using a nerve agent against them. It's low level and should prove toxic to plants - including the spores inside of the colonists - but not to humans. I felt like I was channeling Owen here by agreeing to it but that's what I did. I put it in my grenade launcher in place of incendiary explosives. I almost feel a little sad saying that but, hell, maybe I really was changing.

When we got to the other side of the skyway, first thing we saw were these plant people. No idea what they were but even Kaidan acknowledged they could never have been human. In fact, the colonists were still all too human. The gas grenades worked perfectly, knocking them out but leaving them unharmed. I knew I'd have killed them if there were no other option so I'm glad it worked. Found the way underground to the Thorian when Fai Dan approached. He was fighting whatever control the Thorian had over him. It was commanding him to kill me but he shot himself instead. Poor fool. I still had some gas grenades left. Probably could have knocked him out until I took care of the monster.

I went down and here's what I found:


I know we're in galactic society and we've got an all-female race that reproduces through something like parthenogenesis but someone also uses people of any sex from any race as progenitor. (Even animals? Who knew?) Giant jellyfish. Huge insects running the Citadel. Yet, I still found this creepier than anything else out there. Right in front of me it shit out a green asari, which I had to assume was a thing it made rather than an actual asari. I tried to talk it into giving me whatever it gave to Saren but Saren had predictably betrayed it. Fine by me since I really had planned to kill it anyway. Was just hoping to walk away with information.

It had its weaknesses. It was attached to the walls of the underground area with nodes. I just had to destroy them, which should cause them to fall. It did keep throwing those plant people and what I was now sure were asari clones against me. The thing definitely screamed whenever a node went down, which was downright creepy, but what could I do about it? This thing couldn't be allowed to enslave people for its own purposes. I had a lot of feelings when it came to slavery and none of them were good.

When the damned thing finally broke off and fell into a deep pit, a pod on the wall broke open. Out of it came an actual blue asari, probably the one the Thorian was using to make its clones. This one, Shiala, used to work for Matriarch Benezia. She explained that Benezia had hoped to make Saren more gentle. Typical asari ego at work there, assuming they can just show up and "fix" us lesser beings. Turns out the Thorian was around 50,000 years ago when Protheans lived on Feros. Shiala gained an understanding of Prothean society - of the way they thought - from the Thorian and transferred it to Saren. In this way he could understand the visions from the Prothean beacon on Eden Prime. I needed that myself. She was then offered to the Thorian in trade. Thrown out life unwanted garbage by Saren.

Shiala said she could pass on this same information to me, which she called the Prothean Cipher. I can't say I understood the visions any better afterward but she said it would take some time to assimilate an entire culture into my mind. Then she turned her fate over to me, like I was just going to shoot her in cold blood. When I let her go, she said she was going to help the people of Zhu's Hope. If nothing else, she could probably keep Jeong away from them. There was more I learned from Shiala but then I left to make my report to the Council. They were generally happy, though Sparat-ass had a snide comment to make anyway.

I would put points in lift and singularity. Another thing that will help is once you get to the Citadel, complete everything that can be completed. I recall someone doing that ended up near level 13 before leaving the Citadel for whatever mission.
I agree. When I want to speed through the games, I play as a soldier. My Shepard is like a bulldozer plowing through the enemies.
Take Wrex since he has biotic abilities. For me, regardless of class, I have Ashley and Garrus, if recruited. Using lift against the grasshopper makes the fight very easy

There's no such thing as combos in ME1, this is only from ME2 on But Warp lowers damage protection of enemies and deals damage over time, and Lift and Singularity keep them in the air and they are totally defenseless during that time. I hope you'll have fun with it!

When I played as an adept in ME1, I stick with the pistol. Once I have points in a couple of powers, I use them more than the weapon. I lift an enemy and forget about them. Let the squadmates shoot them.

Faith & Owen Shepard:

Faith: Talked to Captain Kirrahe. He had a plan to bomb a facility where Saren was going to create krogan who were not infected with the genophage but entirely under his control. Couldn't have that. Kirrahe said he could convert his ship's drive into a nuke to destroy the facility. Problem was that it was heavily guarded, and with another AA gun, so we couldn't just drop it from orbit. It needed to be precisely placed. Kirrahe also requested the use of one of my people, one who understood Alliance protocol. Kaidan volunteered, even though he knew it might be a suicide mission. Ashley said she should be the one to go because Kaidan had more technical know-how when it came to handling the bomb. Unfortunately she was right but I told her she'd be okay if she did her job to the best of her ability.

Of course, that meant I was taking an untrained archaeologist into the battlefield with me, along with Alenko. Hopefully she'd come in handy here somehow. Kirrahe also asked for some assistance in disrupting geth activity to make their way a little easier. I was able to disrupt their communications tower, destroy their satellite uplink (making it harder for them to coordinate), took out the geth fliers and cutting the alarms. That made it a bit easier for Kirrahe's team, though not so much for us.

Once inside, we weren't just facing geth and krogan. Salarians also attacked, which meant that they had been indoctrinated. It was unlikely enough that a krogan and salarians were ever fight side-by-side but to work for Saren? No. Never. Found even more of them indoctrinated. Also, a krogan scientist, which was strange enough. And some husks. Finally, an asari scientist who claimed to just want to go free. But that's what the salarians who were locked up also said. Problem here is that she knew about indoctrination. Usually they don't but if she'd been working here for even longer than the STG teams, there's no way she was sane. She helped me but I couldn't risk it. Had to kill her. I didn't precisely want to kill her but even she admitted indoctrination was subtle and happened over a period of days or weeks. All of that aside, she chose to work for him, and she wasn't one of Benezia's followers seeking to make him more gentle.

I was then able to enter what the scientist had referred to as Saren's lab. Inside was another Prothean beacon. This made sense. It had been theorized that Saren had access to a second beacon that filled in the gaps of information missing from the damaged beacon on Eden Prime. And now I'd found it, too. Without hesitation, I touched it. It filled me with information. Still somewhat unclear but not nearly as disjointed as the last time. It also didn't knock me unconscious for half a day.

On exiting, a hologram appeared before me. It was Sovereign, the ship Saren was riding, which I had come to know was a Reaper. I let it know it didn't scare me but it said we were nothing to it. Whenever organic life reached the pinnacle of existence, the Reapers returned and killed them all. They had also built the Citadel and the mass relays, not the Protheans. This meant that they would always know where we were and have easy access to us through the relays. Had we expanded outward on our own, they'd have to see us out. This was downright diabolical. Still, it gave away some weakness by claiming it had no beginning or end. Any creature that had to lie to protect its existence must fear that the truth could destroy them. When I told Sovereign I'd take it out it blew up the beacon and disappeared, followed by Joker telling us that the actual Sovereign was now headed our way.

Now we had to get to the krogan breeding facility to destroy it before Saren had his unstoppable army. It wasn't for me to say whether or not the krogan deserved the genophage but indoctrinated krogan were not going to be safe for anyone. We did disable the AA gun so the Normandy could land right where we needed to place the nuke. Then Kaidan could do his techno-magic and set it off. Seemed like everything was going as planned until I got a call from Ash saying she was pinned down by the geth at the AA tower and would not make the rendezvous before the bomb went off. Kaidan told us to go after her and that's what I did. Off I went with Liara and Private Fredricks, the only other marine I had on hand, while he finished arming the bomb.

Halfway there, Kaidan called to say he was under attack. He wanted me to still go after Ash while he defended the bomb. I honestly couldn't say who I thought needed the most protection. Protocol says highest rank, which is Kaidan. I was also worried the geth might somehow disarm the bomb. I had to go with him but I didn't like it. I hoped Ashley could somehow hold out. I told her to hold on until I could get to her too. She was no fool. She knew I'd never get there. And after I did get back to Kaidan and took out the geth, Saren showed up. I think he would have disabled the bomb if I weren't here.

I talked with Saren. He had deluded himself into believing that if organics made themselves useful to the Reapers we could survive as slaves rather than be destroyed. Problem here was that I had talked to Sovereign. I knew that they had no interest in using us as slaves. They merely wanted us dead and would repeat that cycle with whoever came next in another 50,000 years. I suppose that was indoctrination at work. That meant we were going to have to fight. It wouldn't be easy, either, since he had been the top Spectre prior to being indoctrinated. Still, in the end, I prevailed. Thank god for that alarm that distracted him. Then he fled, the Normandy arrived and we all got out of there. The explosion was easily visible from space.

Kaidan felt bad about surviving, which I understood, but I placed the blame with Saren, not either of us. Then Liara suggested she try to help me fill in the gaps I'd gotten from the beacon on Virmire. Liara joined our minds and was finally able to make sense of it all. The beacons were distress signals, warning of the Reapers, but it came too late. Then she put it together, recognizing the planet Ilos as the location of the Conduit. Moreover, the Mu Relay that Benezia had been looking for was the way to Ilos. Now we knew the entire goal, though we still didn't know what the Conduit did.

I reported to the Council. They still doubted that the Reapers were real, suggesting Saren was playing me, trying to throw me off-balance. In the end, they said the purpose of the Spectres was the take action where they could not. If I decided I knew the real threat, I could chase after it. That's just what I was going to do. Still, I heard that forces were massing at the Citadel, meaning they were taking me seriously. Udina wanted me to meet him at the Citadel to confer on our next move.

We met before the Council. They still didn't believe me and thought if I went to the Mu Relay in the Terminus Systems I'd start a way. But wouldn't it be worth it to save all life from extermination? Worse, Udina locked me out of the Normandy's primary systems so I couldn't take it anywhere. He sold me out and doomed us all to extinction unless I found some other way out.

Went back to the ship, had a chat with Kaidan. He finally admitted his feelings and we almost kissed until Joker interrupted. Said Captain Anderson wanted to meet me at Flux. Couldn't imagine why but I had nothing better to do.

Bunch of stuff that I will link to is from MASS EFFECT TRILOGY: GAME MECHANICS AND CHARACTER BUILD COMPILATION THREAD.



Mass Effect 1 Adept:
You can find some single-playthrough (level 50) ME1 Adept builds in this thread. From that thread:

Lvl 46 Bastion Adept:

00 Basic Armor
00 Pistols
08 Throw (Advanced)
12 Lift (Master)
07 Warp (Advanced)
12 Singularity (Master, with Assault Rifles) or 07 (Advanced, with Shotguns)
12 Barrier (Master)
06 Stasis (Advanced)
07 Assault Rifles (Basic, Frictionless Materials can replace the need for Overkill) or 12 Shotguns (Master)
12 Bastion
08 Charm (12 at the end because of the 4 free points earned during the one playthrough)
04 Spectre Training (Basic)

If you do not care about a second weapon (you don't particularly need it or put points into it), you can move those points into some Basic armor and Pistols. I like have some Shield Boost, at least early game, and Master Marksman can have higher Damage-per-second (DPS) than assault rifles. I would drop Stasis to 1 on a Bastion build.

Singularity and Lift are your best talents, since they will keep most enemies floating in air while you shoot at them. Throw will knock them down at least so you can shoot at them while they get up. Stasis is terrible since it makes enemies immune to damage, until you get the Bastion bonus which lets you harm enemies in Stasis. Warp is a good debuff which lets enemies take more damage, good for enemies with a lot of health or Immunity.

Barrier is not quite as good as Immunity, but still awesome. Bastion bonus for Barrier lets it constantly gain shields over time which is great. 

Capn233 has a leveling guide/walkthrough in this thread.

For armor mods, I recommend the same mods for all classes: Medical Exoskeletons for the health regen and cooldown bonus. You can get a Medical Exoskeleton from Dr. Michel pretty early in the game. (If you use an exploit and a lot of time, you can get it before leaving the Citadel. I usually wait until later before I get it). Basically, the more cooldown the better so you can spam your powers more often. the health regen bonuses are great for staying alive longer.

For squadmates, you will need someone who has Decryption and Electronics skills to unlock stuff, so Kaiden, Tali, or Garrus. Tali is better early game than Garrus, but Garrus is better late game since you will not need to micromanage him to get the best out of him. I actually prefer Kaiden though. All squadmates tend to have a hard time killing things, so I prefer squadmates for their powers, so I prefer Kaiden and Liara on all my playthroughs. (I still kill Kaiden on Virmire 50% of the time, but I will use him up until that point.)

Kaiden has Lift, throw, and Neural shock for disabling enemies. Sabotage is okay I guess, but I find it can backfire if it hits a Krogan or large bipedal Geth unit.
Liara has pretty much all the same powers you have, so Lift, Singularity, and throw are her best powers.
Stasis is not good on either Kaiden or Liara, since they cannot get a Bastion bonus (let you harm enemies in their stasis).
If you really want a combat squadmate, then Ashley is a little better early game than Wrex since she can put points in pistols (Marksman) early but that requires that you micromanage her a little more. Late game, Wrex is better since he is harder to kill with both Immunity and Barrier.

So I recommend for squadmate pairings: (1) Kaiden and Liara, or (2) Liara and Garrus/Tali, or (3) Kaiden and Wrex/Ashley.

Don't worry about having a weak build or squad for an ME1 Adept. No class except for maybe Engineer can be weak by the end of ME1.

As for the final boss, Having two or three Lift powers (your own + squadmate's) can keep him in the air constantly. Robo-Saren is not affected by Singularity, so Lift is your best power against him. Warp helps to take down his massive health pool faster. 


Mass Effect 2 Adept:
My preferred build:

4 - Heavy Throw
4 - Heavy Warp
4 - Heavy Singularity
4 - Pull Field
0 - Shockwave
4 - Bastion
1 - Stasis (requires Lair of the Shadow Broker)

You can replace Stasis with Warp Ammo if you do not have Stasis.

Leveling strategy:
1. At rank 4, you want:

2 - Throw
1 - Warp
2 - Singularity
1 - Pull Field
0 - Shockwave
0 - Biotic Mastery
1 - bonus power

(If you import a level 50-59 Shepard from ME1, you start at level 3, and will gain level 4 after talking with the Illusive Man for the first time before Freedom's Progress).

2. Max Biotic Mastery to Bastion
3. Max Singularity to Heavy Singularity.
4. I would then max Pull to Pull Field, Warp to Heavy Warp, then Throw to Heavy Throw. 

Bonus weapon is up to you. I prefer assault rifles (Vindicator for a backup weapon) or shotguns. 

Best squadmates for an ME2 Adept are Miranda and Thane for Warp-bombs. Defense-strippers like Garrus (Overload) or Mordin (Incinerate) are also good. 


Mass Effect 3 Adept:
Pull/Singularity, Warp, and Throw are all you need. Just power-combo everything to death. Shooting your gun is mostly optional.
Barrier/Fortification/Defense Matrix for damage protection is recommended. I prefer Fortification since it can provide more damage protection and power damage than the other powers.

Comment removed. I don't want to divert this thread over my questions about Adept Shepard builds and strategies.