ME2 - How to complete the collector ship on Insanity?

[Dionysus 🐭]

I'm a level 14 adept. Full Nemesis, 3 points in warp, one in throw, 2 in singularity, 2 in pull, and 3 in barrier. I also brought Miranda and Thane. How is this mission possible? More and more platforms come at me. Miranda is dead almost instantly due to them rushing. The stagger attacks go through shields/barrier and cover, and results in 2 seconds of uninterruptable stagger (which, even as an adept even with barrier up, means almost instant death). I have attempted to waste all of my heavy ammo on the first platform (sometimes it works), but then another platform comes. Any tips? And it's not like I have been struggling with any other mission either. Even the "harder" missions like Garrus' recruitment mission I maybe retried once. I soloed the entirety of the first encounter with the collectors due to my squad dying instantly. It's just, these platforms have a single point of cover, you can't kite, retreat, etc., which is a real issue with those stagger abilities.

[Knightmage Bael]

Level 14? You'll want to be much higher than that. Try level 30 before you go in. I mean its pretty much the same as before. Make sure you have the Armor/Shields/Canon ship upgrades.

The actual mission progress relies upon the loyalty too, so do all the loyalty missions, it'll give defense bonuses at the end for when your squad holds the line.

Send Mordin to escort the crew back. Then take Kasumi and Tali with you to fight the human proto-reaper. I know that sounds like ass, but they have the lowest defense, and will make it more likely that your squad holding the line will start dying off.

Lower defense characters die first. Mordin > Kasumi > Tali > Jack.

[Dionysus 🐭]

Originally posted by Archmage_Bael:

Level 14? You'll want to be much higher than that. Try level 30 before you go in. I mean its pretty much the same as before. Make sure you have the Armor/Shields/Canon ship upgrades.

The actual mission progress relies upon the loyalty too, so do all the loyalty missions, it'll give defense bonuses at the end for when your squad holds the line.

Send Mordin to escort the crew back. Then take Kasumi and Tali with you to fight the human proto-reaper. I know that sounds like ass, but they have the lowest defense, and will make it more likely that your squad holding the line will start dying off.

Lower defense characters die first. Mordin > Kasumi > Tali > Jack.

How do I get out of the ship? It forced me into the cutscene with TIM, and instantly transported me to the ship. It didn't allow me to go anywhere.

[FEZ. TF7]

You've spread your points out too thin, you don't need pull because singularity is better, those points would be better spent elsewhere, barrier slows down power use, you should do Kasumi's mission first to get the Locust SMG

The first poster is on about the suicide mission and not the collector base

[Knightmage Bael]

General insanity combat advice is to favor debuff powers and detonations over raw weapon damage. Tech detonations, Biotic detonations. Unfortunately you don't have combo detonations like in ME3, but powers like warp are good. Incinerate. Overload. Drain. Concussive shot is REALLY good against barriers, too.

[Outbound]

Originally posted by Archmage_Bael:

Level 14? You'll want to be much higher than that. Try level 30 before you go in. I mean its pretty much the same as before. Make sure you have the Armor/Shields/Canon ship upgrades.

The actual mission progress relies upon the loyalty too, so do all the loyalty missions, it'll give defense bonuses at the end for when your squad holds the line.

Send Mordin to escort the crew back. Then take Kasumi and Tali with you to fight the human proto-reaper. I know that sounds like ass, but they have the lowest defense, and will make it more likely that your squad holding the line will start dying off.

Lower defense characters die first. Mordin > Kasumi > Tali > Jack.

The OP is talking about the Collector Ship mission that happens a few missions after Horizon, not the Suicide Mission.

I'd say you screwed up on crew choice: neither Miranda nor Thane is especially effective against Collectors and they're both pretty squishy. Grunt, particularly if he's loyal, is very good on this mission. If she's loyal, Samara is good because Reave both inflicts heavy damage to the Collectors and helps keep her alive.

[FEZ. TF7]

Mirander and Thane are fine, both are effective against the collectors, both of them have warp which will strip barriers and armour, they and Samara are the only squadmates I use, only time I use a different squadmate is when it's required by doing a loyalty mission

[Mooneri]

This probably the toughest mission in the game, because you're pretty well under-leveled if you don't know what to expect. I suggest you reload an earlier save, mine some Element Zero, use Retain powers. Optimal situation would be to reload a save before Horizon, do all loyalty missions and assignments to get as much experience as you can and then go to Horizon.

"Why can't I just load a save before collector ship?" Because there's a five mission timer between Horizon and Collector Ship. This time is best used to recruit members and gaining loyalty to party members who you wish to take on the collector ship.

[Rainnd]

If you have trouble with harbringer bring Kasumi with flashbang. Flashbang completely disables all Harbringers attacks.

For platform fight position your teammates at the cover that right in front of you, they will be mostly safe there. Take the front of the platform yourself and move when necessary.

For praetorian fight position your teammates somewhere far away and kite him, keep distance. The door where 2 husks are will close if you come close.

The rest should be easy.

[sidewinder_G]

First off, you're spread too thin. You do not need every biotic skill to get through this. Keep warp if you want but having 3 members with warp on any collector mission is overkill. Barrier is fine but push AND pull AND singularity ?

Second, the skills you decide to keep, need a certain synergy with the ones that your squadmates have to create biotic explosions. To get an explosion, you need a skill that acts as a primer and a skill that acts as a detonator. Primers are singularity, push, pull. In your case, detonator is warp. Singularity works the best for groups and pull is better than push because to use it to push collectors off the platforms, you need to strip them off their barrier first. Let Thane have push.

Third, if you ORDER your squadmates to hunker down, ergo, point them to crouch behind a certain wall, they will stay there. Miranda and Thane are not just good choices, they are the absolute BEST when it comes to collector missions, especially if you make their warp to be unstable as a final upgrade, their explosions are huge and Harbinger drones won't last two seconds, even on Insanity, if you land some good shots later on.

4th, you might already know this but you don't need to be near your squadmates to revive them. They can be on the other side of the room. Just use the medigel and that's it.

5th, If you want an alternate choice for squadmate, complete Kasumi's loyalty mission and also grab the Locust SMG. Kasumi has an ability called Shadow Strike which is basically a teleporting backstab. And it hits like a truck when the enemy has barriers/armor/shields.

[ositodefelpa]

In addition to other advice, don't forget that singularity can stagger enemies, and prevent their forward movement and actions, even if it doesn't lift them. This is often very useful, particularly for scions.

[Dionysus 🐭]

Originally posted by ositodefelpa:

In addition to other advice, don't forget that singularity can stagger enemies, and prevent their forward movement and actions, even if it doesn't lift them. This is often very useful, particularly for scions.

I've never used singularity as it only seems to be a very temporary stagger that push or pull could do with a lower cooldown.

And I do agree that I spread my points out too much (all I really use is pull, warp, and barrier), but there isn't much I can do about that mid-mission. And I make heavy use of biotic explosions.

My main issue with this mission are with the possessed collectors (Harbinger). Their ability forces you out of cover and staggers you for 2 seconds. Even with barrier, my shields are broken almost instantly, and I am lucky to get out with half health or less. There have been times when I had full shields with barrier active, and then the ability forces me out of cover and staggers me, and I die before the stagger can even wear off because everyone focused their fire on me. There is nothing I can do about this, and it's an ability that this enemy spams all of the time. The only time I find myself surviving an encounter with the collectors is if I manage to kill all of the other enemies before he can use his ability on me (rare), or if i'm in a position that he can't go to or reach me with his ability (also pretty rare).

[DaciValt]

Originally posted by Dionysus:

Originally posted by ositodefelpa:

In addition to other advice, don't forget that singularity can stagger enemies, and prevent their forward movement and actions, even if it doesn't lift them. This is often very useful, particularly for scions.

I've never used singularity as it only seems to be a very temporary stagger that push or pull could do with a lower cooldown.

And I do agree that I spread my points out too much (all I really use is pull, warp, and barrier), but there isn't much I can do about that mid-mission. And I make heavy use of biotic explosions.

My main issue with this mission are with the possessed collectors (Harbinger). Their ability forces you out of cover and staggers you for 2 seconds. Even with barrier, my shields are broken almost instantly, and I am lucky to get out with half health or less. There have been times when I had full shields with barrier active, and then the ability forces me out of cover and staggers me, and I die before the stagger can even wear off because everyone focused their fire on me. There is nothing I can do about this, and it's an ability that this enemy spams all of the time. The only time I find myself surviving an encounter with the collectors is if I manage to kill all of the other enemies before he can use his ability on me (rare), or if i'm in a position that he can't go to or reach me with his ability (also pretty rare).

Singluarity is amazing, it doesn't need to last long but all it has to do is move enemies out of cover and shoot and stop them shooting at you. This is whats important on Insanity, stopping enemies doing stuff and giving you more opportunity to hit them back.

As for harbinger he obviously is a priority target but am not sure how other classes deal with him since I just pop a combat drone to keep him busy for a sec lol. His Barriers and Armour doesn't seem very large tho so a AP pistol and some warp should rip him apart very easily. You can also use singularity to stagger him momentarily.

I would recommend taking thane on this mission (with the incissor) and maybe even mordin with heavy incinerate. Incinerate melts through armour and whilst Mordin can't deal with barriers well he can instantly freeze things when the barriers are down. If SMG (if upgraded to do more damage on shields and barriers) should be more than enough to get through even a pretorian's barrier with you and thane on it too.

[Rainnd]

Originally posted by Dionysus:

Originally posted by ositodefelpa:

In addition to other advice, don't forget that singularity can stagger enemies, and prevent their forward movement and actions, even if it doesn't lift them. This is often very useful, particularly for scions.

I've never used singularity as it only seems to be a very temporary stagger that push or pull could do with a lower cooldown.

And I do agree that I spread my points out too much (all I really use is pull, warp, and barrier), but there isn't much I can do about that mid-mission. And I make heavy use of biotic explosions.

My main issue with this mission are with the possessed collectors (Harbinger). Their ability forces you out of cover and staggers you for 2 seconds. Even with barrier, my shields are broken almost instantly, and I am lucky to get out with half health or less. There have been times when I had full shields with barrier active, and then the ability forces me out of cover and staggers me, and I die before the stagger can even wear off because everyone focused their fire on me. There is nothing I can do about this, and it's an ability that this enemy spams all of the time. The only time I find myself surviving an encounter with the collectors is if I manage to kill all of the other enemies before he can use his ability on me (rare), or if i'm in a position that he can't go to or reach me with his ability (also pretty rare).

Do you have Kasumi with her loayality mission completed? She makes mockery out Harbringer (possesed collector), he can't do anything while flashbanged.

[Replica]

I always specialize in Assault Rifles and do Tali's recruitment mission as one of the five. You get the Geth Pulse Rifle which is awesome.

[Knightmage Bael]

Originally posted by Rainnd:

If you have trouble with harbringer bring Kasumi with flashbang. Flashbang completely disables all Harbringers attacks.

For platform fight position your teammates at the cover that right in front of you, they will be mostly safe there. Take the front of the platform yourself and move when necessary.

For praetorian fight position your teammates somewhere far away and kite him, keep distance. The door where 2 husks are will close if you come close.

The rest should be easy.

Or just use warp. Warp is your best friend on Insanity. It debuffs their damage resistance and is great for taking out barriers and armor.