I mean... Scions hit as hard as geth primes, have 2x as much armor (even after taking Shields into account), praetorians can hit you reliably through cover, swarms are even more of a nuisance than geth bombers, rocket troopers, and swarmers combined, and just... come on. Why do you HAVE to make -everything- possessed?

Its not that hard really....is it?

The Geth's ability to stunlock the player with literally every single unit makes them the more dangerous faction on higher difficulties.

The Collectors have two major advantages: Their health on a per-unit basis is of a higher numerical value than like-classed units of the other factions. This means, in plain English, that Abominations have more health than Husks, Troopers more than Cerberus or Geth Troopers or Cannibals, and so on. Secondly, biotic and tech explosions are currently bugged on the Collectors, and do only a fraction of the damage they're supposed to.

This means weapons-based classes are your primary line of assault against the Collectors. Get out your Harriers, your Geth Plasma Shotguns and your Piranhas. Don't bother with anything less than the best weapon you have in the class you're most comfortable with. Geth Infiltrators are really the class best equipped to counter the Collector onslaught. And counter they can. Between the boosts you'll get from Hunter Mode and Tactical Cloak, and the debuffs you'll initiate with a high-end Proximity Mine, you'll be laying waste to the Collector forces in no time.

When it comes to Scions and Praetorians, the two enemy types you seem to be having the most trouble with, the most obvious advice is the best. Just stay away from them and out of sight. Scions can only penetrate cover if you're standing upright behind it, not pressed against it. Praetorians are similar, although their dual-laser can be dodged by faster characters.

Concerning Praetorians: shoot them in the belly. When they're floating at you, standing, whenever. If you and your squad coordinate effectively, you can stunlock a Praetorian until it dies, because the beast staggers after taking a certain amount of damage per second. You get the idea. Stagger it, stagger it, stagger it. Bring the beast down.

Returning to ME3's multiplayer (mid December) after a bit of a break, I struggled quite a lot with the Collector's as well, but... I have convinced myself that the primary reason why I'm struggling is because:

• I've taken a break, I'm rusty.
• The Collectors fight quite differently than the other enemies, and I've gotten very familiar with the other enemies. (Initially, Dragoons were a huge problem for me as well, but... I find they are the among the least dangerous Cerebus enemies now...)
• They have a lot of similarities with how the Reapers push you into melee combat. But the Collectors' swarms can disable your abilities, and possessed abominations are 1-shot kills if they detonate on you.

In short, they are difficult because they are different.

HistoryInRust has given some pretty great advice, I've only really started to build a strategy against Praetorians, but staggering them is fiendishly effective, as they are pretty easily staggered and have a very long recovery period once they are staggered.

Scions... I find are pretty squishy. Once you start dumping into them, they typically die really quickly. I usually take out their humps first, but you are probably better off just dumping in their heads.

Personally, I've been treating the Scions like Marauders (long range, massive damage) and the Praetorians like Banshees (constantly tries to get into melee range to disable you, and has an easily avoided attack that takes you down), and haven't really that much difficulties. I'm more likely to get taken down by a possessed abomination that I wasn't paying attention to :)

@Mnemoidian said:

Returning to ME3's multiplayer (mid December) after a bit of a break, I struggled quite a lot with the Collector's as well, but... I have convinced myself that the primary reason why I'm struggling is because:

• I've taken a break, I'm rusty.
• The Collectors fight quite differently than the other enemies, and I've gotten very familiar with the other enemies. (Initially, Dragoons were a huge problem for me as well, but... I find they are the among the least dangerous Cerebus enemies now...)
• They have a lot of similarities with how the Reapers push you into melee combat. But the Collectors' swarms can disable your abilities, and possessed abominations are 1-shot kills if they detonate on you.

In short, they are difficult because they are different.

HistoryInRust has given some pretty great advice, I've only really started to build a strategy against Praetorians, but staggering them is fiendishly effective, as they are pretty easily staggered and have a very long recovery period once they are staggered.

Scions... I find are pretty squishy. Once you start dumping into them, they typically die really quickly. I usually take out their humps first, but you are probably better off just dumping in their heads.

Personally, I've been treating the Scions like Marauders (long range, massive damage) and the Praetorians like Banshees (constantly tries to get into melee range to disable you, and has an easily avoided attack that takes you down), and haven't really that much difficulties. I'm more likely to get taken down by a possessed abomination that I wasn't paying attention to :)

Excellent post and I agree. The Collectors are a force completely separate from the others and hence why people seem to have a problem with them. It's easy to say that Cerberus, Geth, and the Reapers all share similarities greater than ones that the Collectors may have so strategies can be passed forward throughout those three enemy types.

I for one, very much enjoy the change and welcome it. It's a fun, different pace and forces you to change up your play style from time to time.