Mass Effect 3

[tomchick]

I’m still confused over how importing characters works vs starting a new character.

If I have a say, level 22 character from ME2, will it start me at level 22?

If I have a level 30 character from ME2, I will be level 30? How does the game handle the fact that I’m so powerful? What if I import a level 10 character?

What happens if I start a new one? Do I get a level 1 character?

Yes to all of the above. And I’m almost positive the enemies are scaled to your level.

-Tom

[stusser]

Yeah, I imported a level 30 character, and I didn’t feel particularly powerful. Opponents still took multiple shots to go down, etc.

[flyinj]

Yes to all of the above. And I’m almost positive the enemies are scaled to your level.

-Tom

Wow. Really. That is some incredible scaling. How do you make a compelling experience from both having a player with the majority of their abilities from hour 0 as well as a player with none of their abilities from hour 0.

One of those scenarios must suffer greatly. Which one does?

I don’t know if I want to import my ME2 character or not.

[TimJames]

A few pages ago, Tom McNamara said new characters start at level 3.

Scaling doesn’t sound too hard. Most of the perks are damage modifiers, with only a few additional tactical options. You have enough points initially to unlock all the powers so gameplay ought to be similar.

[Ryan_Markel]

This is the longest install ever.

[stusser]

That’s a good question. My level 30 character has a maxed-out warp ability, and warp didn’t one-shot anybody, even in the tutorial. That’s as good as warp will ever get. It’s maxed-out. There’s no equipment to make warp do more damage, as far as I know. If it doesn’t one-shot husks in the tutorial, will it still be useful at level 50 in the endgame?

[flyinj]

That’s a good question. My level 30 character has a maxed-out warp ability, and warp didn’t one-shot anybody, even in the tutorial. That’s as good as warp will ever get. It’s maxed-out. There’s no equipment to make warp do more damage, as far as I know. If it doesn’t one-shot husks in the tutorial, will it still be useful at level 50 in the endgame?

Exactly. How is this handled? It sounds really boring to just have a lot of your abilities maxxed, with no interesting growth choices made. That’s half the fun of an RPG.

[Ryan_Markel]

That’s a good question. My level 30 character has a maxed-out warp ability, and warp didn’t one-shot anybody, even in the tutorial. That’s as good as warp will ever get. It’s maxed-out. There’s no equipment to make warp do more damage, as far as I know. If it doesn’t one-shot husks in the tutorial, will it still be useful at level 50 in the endgame?

ME has always scaled to player level as far as I know. It’s supposed to provide a consistent challenge (depending on difficulty chosen).

[Joe_M]

That’s a good question. My level 30 character has a maxed-out warp ability, and warp didn’t one-shot anybody, even in the tutorial. That’s as good as warp will ever get. It’s maxed-out. There’s no equipment to make warp do more damage, as far as I know. If it doesn’t one-shot husks in the tutorial, will it still be useful at level 50 in the endgame?

Probably not if you aren’t using it in conjunction with singularity (which does virtually one shot enemies).

[flyinj]

If you’re level 30 with a lot of abilities maxed out, is there an entirely new ME3 specific upper-tier of abilities to earn? Or do you just get more HP every time you level up?

[Joe_M]

You don’t have a lot of abilities maxed out at level 30. You may have two, with a point or two in a couple others.

[TimJames]

Probably not if you aren’t using it in conjunction with singularity (which does virtually one shot enemies).

Get over to the Insanity run thread!

[RickH]

ME has always scaled to player level as far as I know. It’s supposed to provide a consistent challenge (depending on difficulty chosen).

ME1 on insanity was quite easy with a level 50+ character.

[flyinj]

I guess my question is, was the game designed to be played with an imported character that finished ME2, or was it designed to be played with a brand new character. Which got the most attention.

I’m sure they’d say “I WERKZ GRATE WITH BOTH CUZ WE SCALE LOL”, but I’d really like to know which one was compromised.

[TimJames]

I’m sure they’d say “I WERKZ GRATE WITH BOTH CUZ WE SCALE LOL”, but I’d really like to know which one was compromised.

I don’t know if anyone can answer that right now.

After all, we know game reviewers are terrible at games, so they’re no help.

[Tom_McNamara]

I’ve never played a Mass Effect and have ME2 in the game shelf, with plans to play it as soon as I finish (ha!) Skyrim. Would I be better off just skipping ME2 and going straight to ME3?

I think this was covered a few pages back, but things are moving quickly now, so: The ME trilogy is a genuine three-part story arc and designed that way from the beginning, according to Bioware. Imagine if you skipped Star Wars and Empire Strikes Back and went straight to Return of the Jedi. You’d probably be entertained, but also fairly confused by the lack of character and situation framing. Who are all these people? Why does this person react to that person like so? Why is the audience laughing at this part?

Someone said that the central conflict in ME3 is delivered rather bluntly, regardless of your familiarity with the story. And I think that’s true. But you’ll miss a lot of context, nuance, references, and long-haul payoff on character development.

I think the previous two games are enjoyable in their own right and worth playing if you can make the time – which you will need plenty of, these being BioWare titles. Amazon regularly sells the downloadable versions for $15-$20 and recently had a sale for $5 a pop. (Or was that Steam? I forget). Unfortunately, I don’t think ME2’s DLC has ever been on sale, nor has their ever been a “GOTY” collection, yet the “Arrival” DLC is the narrative glue between the second and third installments. There are also substantial references in ME3 to “Lair of the Shadow Broker.” Some choices from ME1 even appear to get reflected in conversation here, if the save game data was imported to ME2, whose save you then imported to ME3.

It might take you several weeks to go through the first two, plus whatever DLC catches your fancy. But I think it will make your ME3 experience easier to understand as well as more rewarding.

[Thierry_Nguyen]

The level cap is 60, and enemies scale. When I began at level 30, I think I only had one ability maxed out, and by the time I finished the game at level 55, I had almost everything maxed, but one or two unleveled skills.
Progression still feels natural, judging from my co-workers who started from level 1 and me who started at 30.

[TimJames]

One other comment about when to play this game: don’t shortchange yourself because you don’t want to be left out of the buzz and discussion. It’s a little early to tell, but I doubt ME3 is so good you need to drop everything and play it. There’s plenty of time to come back to it. People replay this series all the time anyway.

[Knightsaber]

A buddy of mine is finding the From Ashes DLC to be really crashy/buggy - anyone else noticing that sort of thing?

That would be me. I’m having desktop crashes, sound bugs, Shepard refusing to move at all on the Normandy, more crashes.

Someone else we know playing without the DLC has no issues at all. The ME3 tech forum is plastered with DLC crashing problems.

Am a huge huge ME fan, so this is really disappointing.

[Scotch_Lufkin]

For anyone interested, it seems if you never played The Arrival then those events happened to a squad of troops sent in, and the opening part of ME3 (while stil the same) is due to other issues from ME2 that weren’t DLC and not because of what you had done in Arrival.

So the ME2 DLC truly IS optional.