Packs finally gave me the mighty VENOM!

Now you can try out the joy that is the Venom Fury. Staggers (and mild screenshake) for everyone!

You'd have to first pull the Raider out of her cold, dead hands. 

Lots of staggers, nullifies phantoms, for gold I'd use an adrenaline mod on both and maybe go fire ammo on the Valkyrie. I like to charged shot into a group and then BE while they're staggered. Similar with the Asari, just a slower cooldown because she has warp and not throw. I personally don't run anything other than the raider on the Valkyrie though. If you do charged shots you can quickly follow with uncharged shots like you can do with the graal. I've accidentally taken the Venom Fury to plat with no equipment and 3 in fitness and done well enough not to hurt the team while still being agressive, mostly because of the Venom. 

Biotic Explosion so charged shot to stagger a group then run in and Annihilation Field>Throw/Warp for the BE. Throw's cooldown is incredibly low as is so it doesn't really suffer from a heavy weapon so it's more forgiving than Warp and Tech armor.  I use the BEs as compliments to the crazy Warp IV/Incendiary IV damage from the shotguns and since shotguns do massive damage you get massive damage boosts from ammo, especially with the Venom because it's one grenade thing. Venom Fury gets a crazy boost from warp ammo: a charged shot does 1621 to armor and warp IV rounds give an extra 751 and 1590 (basically another charged shot!) to barriers so if you prime that banshee with dark channel she's dying quick. This is also why I love it against collectors because they are all barriers and armor. Venom Valkyrie gets another crazy damage boost from priming everything, however warp's cooldown is a little longer. If you aren't exploiting warp/incendiary glitch you can go for recharge on warp to bring the cooldown to ~3.5 seconds. Raider X weighs just as much as the Venom X. 

Now the reason I don't use smgs (Hurricane would be a go to if I did) is because these kits are in your face and you want shit to die quickly and nothing is better at that than shotguns. I think the Raider is one of the higher DPS guns in the game and shines at close range, which happens to be where annihilation field primes at. Venom can get you out of some tight situations because it staggers so reliably so it's always good to have a charged shot ready in case you round a corner and there's a phantom ready to greet you. Let go of the trigger and the shot goes off even if you get melee'd. Here's TTT doing her thing (this is what I model my Valkyrie play after):





You can be more aggressive with a team, but the main thing is the BE's compliment the weapons. Fury is very similar and a little more cracked out with adrenaline mods.

Man, that sounds awesome, it's never even occurred to me to play those kits like that. I typically go for ultra fast cooldowns and power combos on those two.

I'll take a look at that build.

Only thing is, I do have a Raider X, but my Venom's only level I.

I'm still getting used to the Venom lol. I tried it out on the AIU and the Salarian Infiltrator, but I forgot how strangely charged weapons behave on infiltrators. It wasn't a great success, to say the least. Also, I noticed you need to aim really precisely with the Venom. It's not like you aim at the floor and enemies fly, no, you actually need to hit them precisely. Like I said, still getting used to the damn thing, only unlocked it last night.

I am very disappointed in all of you gang!!! I mean nobody even mentioned the ONE AND ONLY legitimate kit for using the Venom and that's the SE (incendiary ammo for max. cheese). 

I am sure SalMasRac will agree...

Also if it hasn't been mentioned yet, Fury/Valk and Venom are all effected by lag considerably, I highly suggest hosting when using these kits/combo's. Annihilation Field's primer needs to be ASAP or you run into... difficulties. Venom shots that land behind the enemy are also a significant problem.

The one big downside of hosting, 90% DR Phantoms, still get messed up by both those kits and the Venom; really it's win/win unless you're "RUSbotbbot" hosting from Siberia with a potato.

You just mentioned him in passing ; my point is: SE + Venom and/or Scorpion (+ Inc. Ammo) = call me Mordin.

Yeah, this is undeniable. This sucks especially for me because they're practically my favourite kits, but my connection is too slow to host, really. People will complain.



Yeah, I had this happening constantly when I first tried out the Venom.


Phantoms are 90% damage resistant to hosts? Really? (I hardly ever host, so yeah)

nothing about the Valkyrie, or any of dem Blueberries for that matter, is ever off topic

Dalakaar's and HamleticTortoise's point on Fury/V's lag sensitivity is an important one to consider OP. and while personnly quite comfortable takin my V out UUG pugging i ususally do swap CQC weapons for the CSMG or Hurrdurricane. Yep, just like you mention you do, although not for the cooldown reasons per se but for the ease of mid-long range engagement on larger maps and to cater for the laggeir games where BEs turn situational. my first gold Asari solo was CSMG V btw.

don't be reluctant to host either what's the worst gonna happen really it's just a game in the end. and ME3MP ain't constrained so much by the bandwidth but on latency (NZ-based player here have the extensive firsthand experience) so a semidecent connection should be fine. i, probably, would not advise hosting public lobbies using dial-up or while watching HD porn, but beyond that knock yourself out. the playerbase is dwindling so you're either will get no one at all and will have to solo, get one of the old-timers who either will stay or leave depending on how bad lag (a lot of them laugh in lag's face like andy_3_913 and Schachmatt123 did playing my host) will be, or one of those new wave peeps from the Origin Access/MEA hype would drop in and they wouldn't know what's going on anyways hehe. playing on-host is a lot of fun, despite some of the host-specific BS, and is in fact recommended in a few cases

ahem... i'm losing my train of thought now with all the rambling, so better wrap up. one thing i wanted to mention regarding Venom specifically (smooth eh, very subtle!) and it's no intent to rain on your parade like i said glad you finally unlocked it, - you may find that Venom I ain't necessarily that great (plain heresy i know) upgrades unfortunately do matter and it's going to be awhile before you can see it fully shine

P.S. just a couple things to try, some of my personal favourites, - Raider Fury (AM with friends cause "wheeeeee" and CM in pugs) and the Eclipse Commando (Claymoar V) cause ME2!
P.P.S. for a shameless plug for ME Themed Challenges ( here's the thread and website) because why not! there's a few challenges that involve Venom there too also the Outlier Series come with σ5 – Plague is an awesome challenge for a SMG V experience.
P.P.P.S. if you're on PC, feel free to add me timezones permitting happy be to be a guinea pig to try your host out

Unfortunately I no longer have a proper PC to play ME3 on, I can only play it on Xbox 360. I wish I had a new PC, because I really prefer to game that way. =\ Also MPApr2012

Anyway. Yeah, you can give the Shadow a shotgun for the better melee attachment (I'd go with a Disciple then, because I think it's one of the lightest), but if you like to use Slash every now and then, the power mod on the pistol comes in handy. It's kind of a trade-off. I do sometimes use Slash against groups, or when we're doing the Hack objective.

And yeah, when doing gold the better strategy on the Valkyrie is indeed to keep Annihilation Field and Tech Armour going. It does make sense to put a shotgun on her, it's just that I'm very fond of the power mods, so I usually run with the Talon pistol (which also gives me a faster cooldown).

It's frustrating sometimes though to play the Fury and Valkyrie off-host. You run up to an enemy, and when they're not primed, you really have a problem, especially on the Fury. But like I said, I really shouldn't be hosting with my connection. =\ Though MPApr2012 says I should just do it, here's the thing. I'm sharing my connection with my roommate, who's also gaming. Now it's usually not so bad when joining a game, but people say it really is terrible when I'm hosting when she's playing.

Another great kit I like as a melee build is the Asari Huntress, by the way. Although I still think it's a shame that the animation of the Asari heavy melee leaves you vulnerable for a moment. But when things get too dangerous to keep doing melee, she can still throw powers. I love that kit!