Mass Alex: Mass Effect 2 - Part 07

Ahhh very good, after last week's fuck up I'm glad to see this ready to go at the scheduled time, thanks gents.

This is early! Oh wait, the clocks changed in the US.

That sounds an awful lot like Raiden from MGS talking at about 15:30...

Mass Alex: Tapper Planet Resource

These episodes are getting shorter. Call me selfish but I want more Mass Alex in my life.

Doesn't Chambers let you know if anyone wants to talk when you ask about the crew or whatever? Or am I misremembering?

If that's actually how it works, hopefully someone gets the good word to Alex or Vinny so they don't get bummed out with the constant "come back later" responses.

This series has been pretty special for me, as it inspired me to give the series another run through. I've had quite a few changes happen in my life since I first went through the Mass Effect trilogy. It's been very interesting to see how my choices and interpretations changed over time.

I'm just waiting for the tautology song

I feel like Alex has forgotten or doesn't know about the Krogan Rebellions for him to so harshly judge Mordin, not picking a side, but it's not so easy.

These episodes are getting shorter. At this pace with doing all the DLC and scanning all the planets, this feature will take a year plus.

On one hand, this is my favorite series on this website. On the other hand, I'm starting to feel what I like to call Planet Mining Fatigue.

@cammy: I agree. The Krogan were literally enslaving the Galaxy, and the intent of the genophage was not to drive them to extinction, but to balance out their birthrates to their pre-industrial levels.

I'm a genophage apologist, come at me internet.

About an hour of an episode and half of that is planet scanning. This will take forever to complete.

My precious Krogan son!

Headbutting a Krogan is the best moment in the entire Mass Effect series and that is my opinion. Hopefully Alex does that.

Edit: Nevermind, this isn't the mission. I'm guessing that comes up in the Loyalty mission.

I love Grunt but he may have one of the weakest recruitment missions out of the entire crew.

@vinny regarding the location of Element Zero. It's most commonly found on "garden worlds" and "post-garden worlds" (basically the ones that kinda look like Earth) so it might be worth seeking out those in particular if you're in need of some of dat Eezo!

I've been scrubbing past all the planet scanning. I have no regrets!

One hour a week just ain't enough

Yay! MassAlex. (episode could have been a little longer tho. Just saying, the game is long and all the dlc makes it even longer.)

I think I'm one of the very few (if not only) duders that is actually really enjoying the planet mining, lol.

Please don't let Alex be in charge of the galaxy in two hundred years. I don't want to be a Krogan slave. Genophage 4 lyfe.

Vinny, let Alex know that the two engineers near Grunt have some good conversations with each other but Alex keeps interrupting them.

Aww, Grunt is adorable.

If you like unique dialog, you're missing some from Joker. If you go to Investigate -> Missions or ->The Crew, he will give you some unique dialog about every major story mission and new crew member.

These short episodes are killing me. They can easily fit 2 recruitment missions in in a single episode if they cut out all the mining.

Oh god, the boring scanning.

@vinny @alex HOT TIP: Trigger biotic combos and tech combos for huge damage with a big AOE explosion.

Prime one ability, then detonate with another. This list is incomplete, but is even bigger in ME3.

Targets with Shields (Primer, then Detonator):

• Overload, then Warp
• Overload, then Throw
• Overload, then Incinerate
• Overload, then Shockwave

Targets with Armor, Barrier, or normal (Primer, then Detonator):

• Warp, then Throw
• Warp, then Incinerate
• Pull, then Warp
• Pull, then Throw
• Singularity, then Warp
• Singularity, then Throw
• Incinerate, then Overload
• Incinerate, then Warp
• Incinerate, then Throw

@numbereft: Quinton Flynn voices a number of minor characters in this game.

Any bets on Alex not using Overload once in this entire playthrough?

Shepard.

These episodes are just too short. You should be able to fit more than one mission in each.

Always happy to meet a Krogan. Some of my fav Sci-Fi lore ever.

I stand with Mordin, I never liked Krogans. However, Grunt is way better than Wrex.

@dirt410: For sure, ep. 1 was 2+ hrs go back to that or post 2 vids a week

Pro-Genophage here also. From what I get of the lore, Krogan inevitably come to over-run and conquest with enough numbers. That's how Krogan roll. What's perhaps objectionable was the methods applied, not to their use on the Krogan.

The only good Krogan is the one on your side. And Grunt even made that strictly applicable to the present.

@garr123: I believe she only informs you if they are about to start their loyalty missions

@garr123 said:

@vinny@alex That is indeed one of Kelly's responsibilities! She will tell you if any crew member wants to talk, which will save you time running around the ship asking people if they want to have a chat.

@vinny please have Alex go to uranus in the local cluster and have him launch 2 probes. This is important.

Re: genophage; I feel like the brevity of these episodes and the time it’s taking Alex to play through the series is preventing Alex from remembering a lot of the background lore or greater context.

@alex just thought I'd give a tip from my playthroughs of mass effect 2, the only planets worth mining are the rich ones. Otherwise you just spend ages on the other ones trying to find the right spot to launch a probe. Keep up the good work love the show.

someone needs to tell Alex he's supposed to hook his powers around cover, not just launch them straight at opponents hiding behind boxes

I am having a lot of fun watching Alex play through Mass Effect 2!

That said, I really, really wish they were more vigilant about moving the mouse off the screen.

Unlike some other commenters, I like watching Alex scan planets. I scan the hell outta everything when I play.

There are a TON of planets in the game. More than enough to buy all the upgrades. Because of that, I ended up with lots of leftover resources. On subsequent play-throughs I generally followed this plan:

1. -Every planet, from depleted to rich, gets a probe. I'm marking my territory! No planet remains unmolested. "Shepard wuz here" flag planted on every remote rock out in the ass-end of the galaxy.
2. -Planets less than "good" amount of resources: move on after just the one probe.
3. -Probe rich planets until their level goes down to about medium. Lots of reward, little time, itty bitty dopamine spikes each time I hit a payload. I think that's why some of us like planet scanning and find it relaxing.
4. -Milk eezo planets down to the core. Wring them out.

That's it, no additional scanning. Anyone else do this?

I finished replaying this game not too long ago. While there have been some times where I've just chilled out doin' some planet scanning, I've done enough of it to never want to do it again - so this time, I installed a mod that auto-wins all hacking and gets me everything on every planet with one probe shot. Cheating? If you want to call it that, but I find the hacking and planet scanning to be a pain in the ass more than anything and I've done enough of it to prove that I don't need to do any more of it.

Haha Alex won't do any of this. He's going to pistol the shit out of everything.

@justin258: ooo, I can see where a person might want to cut out all that fluff. I enjoy the minigames, though. I did not enjoy them in ME1, but found them a nice break in ME2 along with the planet scanning. Maybe my mind just uses these things as a lull between intensities.

I imagine they go together. If a person likes the hacking, they might be more likely to enjoy the planet scanning as well. And vice versa.

I'm on Team Mordin. Did what was necessary.

The genophage thing is one of the most interesting conflicts in the series. If I remember correctly, the salarians were responsible for the rise of the krogans by recruiting them to fight some other shit, but it got out of control.

Mass sterilization is kind of a war crime in its own right, imho. I always felt conflicted on that topic. The lore in this series is great.